When International Law Becomes Selective

Recent U.S. foreign policy reflects a growing shift away from the rules-based international order. Through its withdrawal from numerous international organizations and agreements, and its increasing reliance on unilateral sanctions and bilateral deals, Washington has steadily weakened the very legal framework that the international community painstakingly built over decades.

Against this backdrop, the recent U.S. allegations accusing Sudan of using chemical weapons appear to be another manifestation of this approach. Sanctions have effectively preceded the investigative mechanisms established under the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), placing the cart before the horse. Allegations of such gravity should not be transformed into punitive measures before being examined through the institutional procedures created by the international community for precisely this purpose.

International treaties were not drafted merely to regulate relations when states agree; they exist primarily to govern disputes when states disagree. Once these agreed mechanisms are bypassed, the issue ceases to concern only the accused state. It becomes a question of the credibility of the international legal order itself. Defending these institutions, therefore, is not about defending Sudan; it is about defending the rule of international law.

Sudan, a former member of the Executive Council of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), has never rejected cooperation with the Organization, nor has it objected to an independent technical investigation. On the contrary, it has repeatedly reaffirmed its full commitment to the Chemical Weapons Convention, while insisting that any allegations be addressed through the Convention's established procedures rather than through unilateral political measures.

Ironically, Washington engaged with Khartoum for more than a year through a bilateral mechanism without publicly producing material or technical evidence capable of substantiating its allegations. During that period, Sudan repeatedly urged the United States to dispatch American experts or a technical fact-finding team to conduct on-site verification. Instead of pursuing that course, Washington opted for unilateral sanctions.

History, however, has witnessed this pattern before.

In 1998, the United States accused Sudan of producing chemical weapons and, based on those allegations, unilaterally destroyed the Al-Shifa Pharmaceutical Factory in Khartoum—then one of Africa's largest pharmaceutical facilities and a strategic national project capable of supplying a substantial share of Sudan's essential medicines.

Sudan subsequently called for an independent international technical investigation to verify the allegations. That request never materialized. In both law and international relations, a claimant confident in its evidence would ordinarily welcome an impartial investigation, as it would validate its position. When the accusing party opposes an independent inquiry while the accused insists upon it, legitimate questions inevitably arise regarding the credibility of the allegations themselves and the legal basis upon which force was employed against Al-Shifa.

Only a few years later, the world witnessed an even greater tragedy. Iraq was invaded in 2003 on allegations that it possessed weapons of mass destruction and maintained links to Al-Qaeda. Those claims were later discredited, and successive U.S. administrations acknowledged serious intelligence failures. Yet the Iraqi people continue to bear the devastating human, political, and economic consequences of a war launched on false premises.

The same selective approach is evident in Washington's relationship with the International Criminal Court (ICC). When the Court investigates U.S. nationals or its allies, Washington denounces the institution and questions its legitimacy. Just weeks ago, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared on X and in an article published in The Wall Street Journal that the ICC and its supporters were "waging war" against the United States through international law and treaties rather than bullets or missiles.

Yet the United States has shown no hesitation in invoking or encouraging the Court's work when doing so advances its strategic interests in other contexts, including Sudan. Such inconsistency reflects a troubling double standard in its approach to international justice.

Viewed against this broader backdrop, the latest allegations against Sudan cannot easily be separated from the political and military realities on the ground. They coincide with significant battlefield gains by the Sudanese Armed Forces, including the recapture of strategic territory, the reopening of military operations in Darfur, and growing pressure on militia supply lines.

These developments have also coincided with parallel efforts, particularly in the United Kingdom, to tighten restrictions on Sudan's gold sector, raising legitimate questions as to whether unilateral sanctions and economic pressure are increasingly being employed as instruments to influence the military balance rather than to uphold international law.

The fundamental issue, therefore, extends far beyond Sudan. It concerns a principle upon which the international legal order depends: serious allegations must be established through independent international investigations, and sanctions should follow verified findings—not replace them.

When law is subordinated to political expediency, and institutions created to ensure impartiality are circumvented, the rules-based international order is weakened for everyone. In such circumstances, the rule of law gradually gives way to the law of power—a precedent whose consequences will ultimately extend far beyond any single country.

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