Key Takeaways
- Member states of the International Criminal Court voted 82-13, with 15 abstentions, on July 24, 2026, to remove Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan — the first time in the court’s 24-year history that a sitting prosecutor has been dismissed.
- The Assembly of States Parties (ASP) found Khan committed “serious misconduct and a serious breach of duty” tied to allegations from a junior aide in his office; Khan denies all wrongdoing and plans to challenge the decision, though no formal appeal mechanism exists under the Rome Statute.
- A three-judge advisory panel had unanimously concluded in March 2026 that the evidence did not meet the “beyond reasonable doubt” standard for misconduct — a finding the ASP Bureau ultimately set aside.
- The arrest warrants issued during Khan’s tenure — including those against Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — remain legally binding, since only ICC judges, not the prosecutor or the Assembly, can modify or revoke them.
- Deputy Prosecutors Nazhat Shameem Khan and Mame Mandiaye Niang will run the Office of the Prosecutor while the ASP begins the process of electing a permanent successor, a vote not expected before 2027.
Why This Vote Matters Now
For the first time since the International Criminal Court opened its doors in 2002, its member states have voted to remove a sitting chief prosecutor from office. On Friday, July 24, the Assembly of States Parties convened a closed-door special session at United Nations headquarters in New York and, by secret ballot, ended Karim Khan’s tenure roughly five years into his nine-year term.
The vote caps nearly two years of disciplinary proceedings triggered by sexual misconduct allegations from a member of Khan’s own staff — allegations that became entangled, almost from the moment they surfaced, with the court’s most politically explosive work: the arrest warrants Khan sought against Israeli and Russian leaders. That collision between a personnel scandal and geopolitics is why the outcome matters well beyond the question of one official’s fate. It touches the court’s independence, the durability of its highest-profile warrants, and whether the ICC can weather sustained pressure from Washington without bending its own procedures.
How the Vote Broke Down
According to diplomatic sources cited by multiple outlets, 82 of the ICC’s 125 member states voted in favor of removing Khan — comfortably clearing the absolute majority of 63 required under the assembly’s rules. Thirteen states voted for Khan to remain in his post, 15 abstained, and the remainder did not take part in the closed-door session.
ASP President Päivi Kaukoranta announced the result to the assembly, stating that member states had determined Khan “committed serious misconduct and a serious breach of duty” and had voted to remove him from office. Kaukoranta framed the outcome as an act of institutional self-protection, telling delegates the process reflected a “spirit of unity” in defense of the court’s integrity so it could continue its work “in the interests of the international community as a whole and victims of atrocity crimes.”
Under Rule 31 of the ICC’s Rules of Procedure and Evidence, the removal took effect immediately.
The Allegations and the Investigation Timeline
The case traces back to October 2024, when Associated Press reporting first revealed that Khan was facing internal accusations of sexual misconduct from a woman who served as his direct legal assistant — identified in later reporting only by the pseudonym “Sarah,” a Malaysian lawyer. The ASP’s Bureau commissioned an investigation by the United Nations Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) that November. A second woman came forward roughly a year later, alleging Khan had abused his position of power over her as well.
Khan voluntarily stepped back from day-to-day prosecutorial duties in May 2025 while the OIOS inquiry proceeded, handing interim control of the office to his two deputies. Investigators eventually compiled a 150-page report backed by roughly 5,000 pages of supporting evidence, submitted in December, concluding there was a factual basis for the allegations and that witness accounts lent support to the aide’s account.
That report then went to a three-judge advisory panel tasked with assessing whether the conduct met the criminal standard of proof “beyond a reasonable doubt.” In March 2026, the panel unanimously concluded that the OIOS findings — while describing what it characterized as nonconsensual sexual contact in Khan’s office, at his private residence, and while on mission — did not establish misconduct or a breach of duty under the applicable legal framework. That advisory opinion was non-binding.
Weeks later, a majority of the ASP’s 21-member Bureau voted to set the panel’s conclusion aside and formally suspended Khan in June 2026, teeing up Friday’s full assembly vote.
Khan’s Defense and the Due-Process Fight
Khan has “categorically” and consistently denied the allegations. His attorney, Tayab Ali of the London firm Bindmans LLP, argued in the run-up to the vote and again afterward that the process bypassed the one independent judicial assessment on record — the judges’ panel — in favor of a political headcount. Ali said the ASP’s finding was “unsupported by any lawful or properly reasoned finding” that Khan had committed misconduct, and that his client “has denied the allegations from the outset and continues to do so.”
Ali also said Khan was barred from attending the session where his fate was decided and had not been given a formal opportunity to respond before the vote. He signaled Khan intends to contest the outcome “through all available legal mechanisms,” though legal experts note that neither the Rome Statute nor any ICC procedural text provides an appellate route to overturn an Assembly vote.
More than 180 rights organizations and Palestinian civil society groups had petitioned the ASP ahead of the vote, arguing — as one joint statement put it — that the disciplinary process had been reduced to a “political referendum” shaped by the national interests of individual states rather than by the judges’ own findings.
The accuser has also spoken publicly. In an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour shortly before the vote, she said her complaint was genuine but had since “been weaponised by parties with their own agendas” on both sides of the case.
The Netanyahu and Putin Warrants: What Doesn’t Change
Khan’s office sought some of the ICC’s highest-profile arrest warrants of the past decade: against Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2023 over the alleged unlawful deportation of Ukrainian children; against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and then-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in 2024 over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity connected to the Gaza war; and against senior Hamas leaders, several of whom have since been killed. His office had also pursued warrants tied to the Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte, Myanmar’s military leadership, and Taliban officials in Afghanistan.
None of those warrants are affected by Khan’s removal. Under ICC procedure, arrest warrants are judicial decisions issued by the court’s Pre-Trial Chambers — independent of the prosecutor — and only sitting ICC judges can modify or withdraw them. Removing the chief prosecutor changes who leads the office pursuing those cases; it does not touch the underlying judicial rulings.
That distinction hasn’t stopped Israeli officials from pressing the point publicly. Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar called Khan’s removal “long-delayed” and argued the warrants against Israeli officials — issued, he noted, against a state that isn’t an ICC member — “should never have been sought in the first place and should be revoked immediately.” Palestinian representatives and allied rights groups have pushed back on framing the vote as a verdict on the Gaza-related warrants at all, arguing the ASP’s decision was about internal accountability, not the merits of any pending case.
Washington’s Pressure Campaign
The vote lands amid an intensifying campaign by the Trump administration against the court. In February 2025, President Trump signed an executive order reinstating and broadening sanctions against ICC officials, a policy first introduced during his previous term. Khan himself was sanctioned, along with roughly a dozen other ICC judges and staff, over the warrants targeting Netanyahu and Gallant and in connection with a since-shelved investigation into alleged crimes by U.S. forces in Afghanistan.
Just eleven days before the removal vote, Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote in the Wall Street Journal that Washington intended to use “all the tools at our government’s disposal” to “dismantle the ICC — brick by brick, if necessary.” Former EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, weighing in ahead of the vote, argued that the Trump administration and Netanyahu government shared a common goal: shielding soldiers, border agents, and allied officials from the reach of any international court.
Khan’s legal team has pointed to that backdrop directly, with Ali arguing the prosecutor was removed “while under sanctions and while the Court is under immense political pressure” — a sequence, he said, with implications reaching well beyond Khan’s individual case.
What Happens Next
The Office of the Prosecutor will continue operating under Deputy Prosecutors Nazhat Shameem Khan and Mame Mandiaye Niang, who have effectively run the office’s day-to-day docket since Khan first stepped back in May 2025. The ASP’s removal decision simultaneously triggers the formal process of electing Khan’s permanent successor to serve a new nine-year term — a process legal observers say is unlikely to produce a new prosecutor before sometime in 2027.
Procedurally, Khan’s options are narrow. While his lawyers have vowed to contest the decision “through all available legal mechanisms,” experts including those tracking the case for Just Security note that neither the Rome Statute nor the ICC’s other governing texts provide any avenue for judicial or appellate review of an Assembly removal vote. Any challenge would likely have to unfold outside the court’s own structures — through political pressure, external legal action, or public argument — rather than inside them.
FAQ
Does removing Karim Khan cancel the ICC arrest warrant against Netanyahu? No. Arrest warrants are issued by ICC judges, not the prosecutor, and only those judges can modify or withdraw them. Khan’s removal changes who leads the prosecutor’s office; it has no direct legal effect on the warrants against Netanyahu, Gallant, or Putin.
Why was Karim Khan removed instead of simply resigning? Khan has denied the allegations throughout and, according to his lawyers, was not offered a resignation off-ramp; the ASP proceeded to a formal removal vote under Article 46 of the Rome Statute after its Bureau set aside a judicial panel’s finding that misconduct had not been established.
Can Karim Khan appeal his removal? His lawyers say he intends to contest the decision, but legal experts note that neither the Rome Statute nor ICC procedural rules provide a formal appeals process for an Assembly of States Parties vote.
Who leads the ICC prosecutor’s office now? Deputy Prosecutors Nazhat Shameem Khan and Mame Mandiaye Niang are overseeing the office on an interim basis while the Assembly begins the process of electing a new chief prosecutor, a vote not expected before 2027.
Closing Analysis
The unresolved question isn’t whether Khan is gone — that’s now final and immediate — but whether the process that removed him becomes a template or a cautionary tale. A prosecutor’s office shielded a judicial panel’s unanimous finding, only to see it overridden by a state-level vote unfolding alongside intense U.S. sanctions pressure; that sequence is exactly what Khan’s lawyers and allied rights groups argue sets a troubling precedent for prosecutorial independence at the court. Watch for how the ASP structures the succession vote, whether any state or bloc attempts to use the interim period to influence the docket, and whether Khan’s team pursues any external legal challenge, given the absence of an internal appeals route.
