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Middle East Eye published another article yesterday, largely summarising a legal opinion by Abdul Koroma, a former International Court of Justice judge, shared with ICC member states earlier this month. The core message of that opinion is straightforward and a direct threat.
It tells ICC member states: if you remove Khan, he will appeal to ILOAT, his chances of winning are considerable, and you should be prepared to pay him over a million dollars in compensation.
Koroma then concludes that the bureau should adopt the panel’s report and close the matter. If this is not a direct attempt to influence the outcome of an ongoing investigation, I do not know what is. And it is precisely the kind of pressure campaign that only one party, in this case, has the institutional weight, the network, and the resources to orchestrate, and now a former ICJ judge writing legal opinions on his behalf and international media platforms amplifying them on cue. Clearly, one party has everything. The other has nothing.
Koroma’s opinion raises serious problems, both in its legal reasoning and in its purpose. And MEE’s decision to give it a platform and amplify it to a global audience raises equally serious questions about editorial judgment. Let me take them one by one.
First, Koroma apparently believes that the prospect of compensation at the tribunal should deter ICC member states from pursuing this case. He should know better. Since when has the prospect of losing at tribunal ever deterred international organisations, and particularly the UN, from taking the worst decisions against staff?
I have personally heard an ASG fire a staff member in retaliation and say, with complete indifference:
“Let them go to the Tribunal! What can they do? The maximum they can get is two years’ salary.”
That is how these senior officials view the administration of justice: as a cost of doing business, not as a deterrent. The compensation is not paid from their own pockets. It is paid from assessed contributions of member states, who, last time I checked, have never lost sleep over a tribunal award.
Koroma now suddenly invokes that same system as a warning to those same member states. The irony would be amusing if the stakes were not so serious. And one more thing: where was Koroma when genuine whistleblowers were retaliated against, went to the tribunal, won, and were never reinstated or adequately compensated? We did not see him wave the threat flag then. We did not see him write seven-page legal opinions warning member states about the cost of wrongful termination when it was other staff members on the receiving end. The answer is simple. Koroma defends Karim Khan. Heavy weights defend heavy weights. They are not interested in the voiceless.
Second, what Koroma is arguing, stripped of its legal dressing, is this: do not pursue a case of alleged serious sexual misconduct against the prosecutor because if he appeals, you might have to pay him a million dollars.
Let that sink in.
He is suggesting, whether intentionally or not, that the financial exposure to the organisation should be weighed against the decision to pursue accountability for alleged abuse.
That is not a legal opinion.
That is a message to the bureau that the price of justice is too high. And on the numbers themselves, one million dollars is not the extraordinary figure Koroma and MEE are presenting it as. ILOAT, UNDT, and UNAT regularly order two years’ salary for wrongful termination. Take two staff members at P5 or D1 level and you are already at a million dollars. This is everyday business for these organisations. It has never stopped a single USG or ASG from terminating staff they wanted gone.
Contrary to what Koroma alleges, exemplary damages may only be ordered in exceptional circumstances, specifically when an organisation’s conduct has been found to be in gross breach of its obligation to act in good faith see ILOAT D. M. (Nos. 12 and 13) v. EPO Judgment No. 4391 para 14. and ILOAT Judgment No. 3966 H (No2) v EPO 2018 para 11 .
That bar is exceptionally high and rarely met. Koroma presents it here as a likely outcome rather than a solid legal assessment. It is a number designed to frighten member states that may not be experts in international administrative law. Koroma and MEE need to be more careful about playing out these exaggerated narratives to a public that is not necessarily versed in the jurisprudence they are selectively invoking. The difference is that when compensation is awarded to common staff, nobody writes a seven-page legal opinion about it.
Third: MEE’s sensational headline is misleading, and I am afraid deliberately so.
The rules of ILOAT, UNDT and UNAT are unambiguous: if a termination is found to be unlawful, the tribunal is mandated to order reinstatement. That is not a scoop and is not a threat. That is the standard rule of procedure that applies to every single international civil servant across every UN tribunal, from the P2 clerk to the G6 assistant to the D1 director and yes, the ICC prosecutor. That is not a special privilege of Karim Khan. That is the baseline.
Article VIII of the Statute and Rules of the ILO Administrative Tribunal (consolidated version) specicifically states that.
To craft a headline like “ICC could be ordered to reinstate prosecutor if it removes him” is to present as a revelation what is in fact the standard procedural outcome for any staff member whose termination is found unlawful. His case would look very much like any other. The only difference again is that when it is a common staff member, nobody writes about it or asks MEE to run a front page story about it.
What MEE and Koroma are deliberately omitting is the other half of that rule: in the entire jurisprudence of UNDT and UNAT, with the exception of one local staff member at G6 level, not a single staff member has ever actually been reinstated despite a tribunal ordering it. And contrary to what Koroma argues, there is absolutely zero chance of the prosecutor being reinstated even if he prevails on appeal.
If a decision is made to remove Khan and he appeals, the ICC will immediately appoint a new prosecutor. The jurisprudence of all international tribunals is clear on this: organizations must be able to continue their mandate even when a staff member has been wrongfully terminated. If every termination required waiting for the conclusion of legal proceedings before filling the position, these organisations could not function. That is precisely why they always elect payment in lieu of reinstatement; they fill the position immediately after the incumbent leaves, and it is legally near impossible to strip a new incumbent of a binding contract for a legal dispute they were not party to. The same would apply here without any question.
Organisations consistently elect payment in lieu of reinstatement and that is everyday business for them. It has never stopped a single USG or ASG from removing staff they wanted gone. To frame the standard tribunal remedy of reinstatement as a sensational threat hanging over the heads of member states is exploiting the ignorance of the public in international administrative law , and exploiting the media once again to lead a public pressure campaign under the disguise of legal expertise.
Finally and this is the most important point, it is simply an affront to the dignity of the complainant and to every woman who has survived sexual harassment, abuse, exploitation and rape inside these institutions to even suggest that an alleged offender should simply walk free because the compensation bill might be high.
That is the logical conclusion of Koroma’s argument and MEE’s decision to amplify it without challenge.
Do they understand what their messaging says to every staff member inside these organisations who is weighing right now whether to speak up?
It says: his financial interests outweigh your right to justice.
It says: the price tag on his career matters more than what may have happened to you.
It Screams: Stay Silent.
Khan himself said in one of his interviews:
“If a process can be suborned, if it can be subverted, if it can be undermined, because state appointees and diplomats, for whatever reason, think they know better, then this is a template for getting rid of any elected official, now or in the future, on spurious or flimsy or fabricated or unfounded grounds.”
Fine words.
But what Khan is doing through Koroma and MEE is precisely that: attempting to suborn a process, to pressure member states, to shape the outcome of a live disciplinary proceeding through a sustained, well-resourced, highly networked public campaign.
The complainant has none of that. She has a confidentiality agreement and faces termination if she breaches it. Article 42(3) of the Rome Statute requires the prosecutor to be a person of high moral character.
Nowhere does it say that high moral character can be purchased with a legal opinion and an ultra-sophisticated media campaign.
