Washington Sanctions a Japanese — and Tokyo Calls It 'Regrettable'

The day the rules stopped applying

In September 2025, the United States designated Akane Tomoko, chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, as a sanction target. The reasons were not made clear in detail, but the implication was unmistakable: Washington was punishing a Japanese official for exercising independent prosecutorial judgment — and the target happened to hold a post at an institution the US has refused to join.

Japan’s response was a study in minimalism.

Six hours passed before the Foreign Ministry issued its first formal statement. When it came, the words were careful, almost rehearsed: “大変残念だ” — very regrettable. Not objectionable. Not unacceptable. Regrettable. A word that expresses disappointment without drawing a line.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi added her own contribution three hours later, telling reporters that Japan shared the same regret and would continue to coordinate with the United States and other partners. The phrase has since been dissected across every major Japanese outlet and policy forum. It was also dissected by Minori Onihara, a Reuters correspondent who has covered Tokyo’s economic and foreign policy beats since 2005, and who filed the original report on September 25 from Reuters Japan.

The sentence matters because it captures, in a single adjective, a country caught between two versions of itself: the postwar Japan that championed international institutions, and the contemporary Japan that increasingly calculates its interests in narrow, transactional terms.

A government torn between two loyalties

The domestic reaction within Japan was immediate and unusually sharp — a sign that even officials accustomed to quiet diplomacy saw this moment as different.

At a Liberal Democratic Party meeting on September 21, lawmakers pressed the government to do more. “Isn’t Japan’s role to protect Ms. Akane?” one asked, according to Reuters reporting. The most forceful rebuke came from a cross-party group led by former Defense Minister Gen Nakatani, which issued a statement on September 24 calling Japan’s response “considerably weaker than that of other countries” and arguing bluntly that “regrettable is a feeling, not a position.”

Tama Yuichiro of the Constitutional Democratic Party took to social media urging the government to issue guidelines preventing Japanese financial institutions from overreacting and cutting off business ties with the ICC — a practical move that acknowledged both the political pressure and the economic reality.

But the government remained locked in a calculus that officials privately described as exhausting. One senior figure, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters the government had initially promised a rapid response — then waited six hours. The delay itself was revealing: a sign not of indifference but of deliberation under constraint.

“If we criticize the US too harshly, the problem doesn’t get solved,” one foreign policy source said. “If Trump escalates, he can always say Japan is the obstacle and refuse to de-escalate.”

Another source pointed to the broader architecture of dependency: Japan relies on the US for its security umbrella, and the dollar payment system remains the backbone of its financial infrastructure. “Japan can’t afford to make this public,” the source said. “What leverage does it have?”

The real question isn’t about one prosecutor

The Akane case is not simply about one individual or one institution. It is about what happens when the world’s most powerful country begins treating international legal bodies as instruments of policy rather than arbiters of law.

The United States has never been a party to the Rome Statute, which established the ICC. It has periodically threatened sanctions against ICC officials who pursue cases involving American personnel or allies. What is new — and what makes this case so destabilizing — is that the target is a Japanese national, sitting at the helm of an institution Japan helped strengthen and fund.

Japan is one of the ICC’s largest financial contributors. It has consistently argued that the court plays a vital role in upholding the postwar rules-based order. And now its own prosecutor has been sanctioned by a country whose military protection Tokyo depends on.

Kazuhiko Maeda, a professor of US politics at Sophia University in Tokyo, told Reuters the Trump administration’s move was consistent with a long-standing American impulse: the idea that the ICC is an inconvenient check on US power and its allies. “This is America First on full display,” Maeda said, “and it leaves a deep scar on the international legal order.”

But Maeda also warned that Japan’s response risked doing its own damage — not to Washington, but to itself. “Japan has built its reputation on being a supporter of the rule of law,” he said. “If it hides this time, it loses that credibility in the long run.”

The long-term cost of short-term prudence

There is a growing school of thought in Japanese strategic circles that the country’s postwar alignment with the United States — while necessary — has become so complete that Tokyo has lost the ability to act independently on issues where Washington disagrees with multilateral institutions. The Akane case is the latest evidence of that dependency, and potentially the most uncomfortable because it struck at the heart of what Japan claims to stand for abroad.

For years, Japanese policymakers have spoken about becoming a “middle power” that champions multilateralism in areas where great powers compete. The ICC appointment was seen as a symbol of that ambition: a Japanese national leading an independent international institution, a country that could credibly argue it stands for something beyond bilateral loyalty to Washington.

That narrative is now under strain. The government’s refusal to escalate — its choice of “regrettable” over “unacceptable” — sends a signal that when push comes to shove, Tokyo will not sacrifice its relationship with Washington for an international court. Whether that calculation is right depends on what you believe Japan’s interests are, and over what time horizon.

What happens next

The immediate aftermath remains uncertain. It is unclear whether the US sanctions extend beyond Akane to other ICC officials or institutions. It is equally unclear whether Japan will face secondary consequences — such as pressure on Japanese banks or credit card companies to limit their dealings with the ICC, or even retaliatory trade measures.

What is clear is that the episode has forced a conversation that Japanese policymakers have been avoiding: how much independence can a middle power afford when its security depends on a superpower that no longer treats international institutions as binding?

As one official acknowledged to Reuters, the government will continue coordinating with Washington. It will also continue expressing support for the ICC in diplomatic forums. But the gap between rhetoric and action has widened, and the Akane case will be remembered as the moment the gap became visible.

Japan’s answer to that question — how to be a rules-based actor when the rules no longer apply universally — will define its foreign policy for years to come.