Nine months after jointly announcing plans to abandon the International Criminal Court alongside two neighboring Sahel nations, Niger has formally submitted its official request to leave the permanent international tribunal, court officials have confirmed.
The Hague-based ICC confirmed in a statement accessed by Agence France-Presse that it received Niger’s formal “instrument of withdrawal” on June 18. Under the court’s governing rules, any withdrawal takes full effect exactly one year after the notification is submitted. The ICC also emphasized that Niger remains bound by all its existing obligations to the tribunal through the entire 12-month transition period.
Back in September 2025, Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso — all three currently ruled by military juntas that rose to power via coups earlier in the 2020s — released a joint declaration rejecting the ICC’s authority over their territories. The trio framed the court as a tool of “neo-colonialist repression” against sovereign states, and announced plans to develop what they called “indigenous mechanisms” to advance peace and deliver justice across the Sahel region. The ICC’s recent statement did not reference any formal withdrawal submissions from Mali or Burkina Faso, leaving Niger’s application as the only one currently processed by the tribunal.
Established in 2002, the ICC was created to investigate and prosecute the world’s most severe offenses: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and acts of aggression. It currently counts 125 member states around the globe, though major powers including the United States, China, Russia, and Israel have never joined the institution.
This latest move follows a broader regional realignment for the three Sahel nations. Last year, all three simultaneously withdrew from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), West Africa’s leading regional integration bloc, and launched their own new cooperative body, the Confederation of Sahel States. As former French colonies, the three nations have grown increasingly estranged from Western powers in recent years and have deepened political, economic, and military ties to Moscow.
Russia itself is not an ICC member, and the court has an active arrest warrant outstanding for Russian President Vladimir Putin over alleged war crimes connected to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Armed forces from all three Sahel juntas have faced repeated international accusations of committing human rights abuses against civilian populations amid a years-long escalating campaign against jihadi insurgents linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State.
If Niger’s withdrawal is finalized next year, it will become only the third country to formally exit the ICC, following the departures of Burundi in 2017 and the Philippines in 2019.