Washington, Oct. 10 (Jiji Press)–U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio pointed to the need for U.S. sanctions on the International Criminal Court, in a telephone meeting with Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi held Saturday. In the phone conversation, the secretary “raised the necessity” of U.S. sanctions on the ICC as a result of the court’s “rogue actions that threaten American sovereignty,” the Department of State said. The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump added The Hague, the Netherlands-based international court to its sanctions list, after taking a similar action against ICC President Tomoko Akane, a Japanese national, in August. The United States is not a member of the ICC. Rubio and Motegi confirmed that they will continue “close coordination” over the issue of the ICC ahead of a meeting of foreign ministers from the Group of 20 advanced and emerging economies in Atlanta late this month. The U.S. foreign chief expressed “sincere condolences” over the death of a Japanese national in a recent murder-robbery case involving a U.S. Marine in the southernmost Japan prefecture of Okinawa. He also showed the United States’ “determination to communicate and fully cooperate with” the Japanese government and local authorities in their investigations into the incident. Earlier this month, the police department of Okinawa arrested the serviceman, stationed at the U.S. Marine Corps’ Futenma air base in the Okinawa city of Ginowan, on suspicion of killing a local woman in a room of a hotel in the Okinawa capital of Naha and stealing her belongings. Rubio and Motegi “reaffirmed the strength of the U.S.-Japan alliance, which is the cornerstone of peace, security and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific and beyond,” according to the Department of State. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]
