The decision of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger to withdraw from the International Criminal Court (ICC) will jeopardize access to justice for victims of atrocity crimes, putting all civilians at greater risk, Human Rights Watch said today. On September 22, 2025, the military leaders of the three Sahel countries signed a joint statement announcing their countries' withdrawal from the ICC.
The announced withdrawal comes during a period of turmoil in the Sahel region. Increasingly repressive military juntas in the three countries have been engaged in armed conflicts with Islamist armed groups. Both government and insurgent forces have carried out war crimes and possible crimes against humanity against civilians. The victims of serious abuses and their families have struggled to obtain redress through national and regional courts.
"The leaders of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, in announcing their departure from the International Criminal Court, are depriving their populations of an important international avenue for justice and redress," said Liz Evenson, international justice director at Human Rights Watch. "The ICC is a global court of last resort, when victims have nowhere else to turn, with investigations in countries around the world."
Under the Rome Statute, the ICC's founding treaty, countries can withdraw by depositing a notification with the United Nations secretary-general. The three Sahel countries have not yet taken this step. Withdrawals take effect one year later. Until then, countries remain bound by their ICC obligations.
For over a decade, Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger have faced insurgencies from Islamist armed groups linked to Al Qaeda and the Islamic State. These armed groups have committed widespread atrocities against civilians, including killing and executing villagers; attacking schools, mosques, and humanitarian convoys; and besieging towns. The militaries of the three countries, assisted by abusive militias and foreign mercenaries, have engaged in brutal counterinsurgency operations, killing, unlawfully detaining, and forcibly displacing tens of thousands of civilians.
The military juntas that have taken power in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger in a wave of coups since 2020 have cracked down on the political opposition, media, and dissent, shrinking civic and political space. They have consolidatedtheir power without elections, delaying the return to democratic civilian rule.
The authorities in these countries have not met their international legal obligations to investigate serious violations of the laws of war by their security forces and by Islamist armed groups, allowing impunity to fester and emboldening abusers. In January, the three countries officially left the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) regional bloc, having served notice a year earlier, depriving victims of abuses of redress in the West African regional court.
The ICC has 125 member countries. The court has opened investigations into alleged crimes in 17 situations, including in Afghanistan, Darfur in Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Libya, Palestine, Ukraine, and Venezuela.
Following a referral by the Malian government in 2012, the ICC prosecutor opened an investigation into the situation in Mali that has played a crucial role in checking impunity. The cases brought thus far before the ICC involved three commanders of the abusive Islamist armed group Ansar Dine.
In September 2016, the court sentenced Ahmad al-Faqi al-Mahdi to nine years in prison after he pleaded guilty to participating in the destruction of religious and historic buildings in Timbuktu, northern Mali, in June and July 2012. In November 2024, the court sentenced Al-Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz to 10 years in prison following his conviction for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including torture, committed between April 2012 and January 2013 in Timbuktu.
In June 2024, an ICC pretrial chamber unsealed an arrest warrant against Iyad Ag Ghaly for war crimes, including sexual violence, and crimes against humanity in northern Mali between January 2012 and January 2013. Ag Ghaly, currently the head of the Al Qaeda linked Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wa al-Muslimeen, JNIM) remains at large.
The ICC is facing politicized threats from those opposed to accountability. The administration of United States President Donald Trump has authorized sanctions against ICC officials, a UN human rights expert, and three Palestinian human rights groups to thwart the court's work in Palestine.
Russia has issued arrest warrants against the ICC prosecutor and eight of the court's current and former judges in retaliation for the court's March 2023 warrant against Russian President Vladimir Putin for alleged war crimes in Ukraine. ICC member countries and civil society organizations have spoken out against efforts to obstruct the court's work.
Two countries with active ICC investigations have left the ICC: Burundi in 2017 and the Philippines in 2019. On March 11, 2025, Philippine authorities acting on an ICC arrest warrant, arrested former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and transferred him to the ICC, where he has been charged with crimes against humanity in relation to alleged extrajudicial killings between 2011 and 2019.
"The announced withdrawal from the ICC treaty by Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger will undermine accountability and deprive people in the Sahel of a critical layer of human rights protection when national courts are unable to check impunity for the worst crimes," Evenson said. "The African Union and ICC member countries should urge Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger to uphold justice and the rule of law and remain members of the court."
