Photo by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
After weeks of speculation that the Nobel Peace Prize might go to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) or the ICC, the Nobel Committee chose Navanthem “Navi” Pillay, a distinguished South African jurist whose career has helped shape international criminal justice.
Pillay was born in Durban in 1941 and came of age under South Africa’s apartheid regime, experiencing its racial discrimination herself. She entered legal practice in 1967 and became the first woman to open a law firm in Natal Province. Her work included representing anti-apartheid activists, among them Nelson Mandela, and defending the rights of people held as political prisoners. In 1995, she became the first black woman to serve as a judge on South Africa’s High Court.
Among her many contributions to international justice, Pillay served as a judge and president of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) from 1995 to 2003, as a judge of the ICC from 2003 to 2008, and as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights from 2008 to 2014. More recently, she chaired the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory and served as a judge ad hoc in The Gambia v. Myanmar, the ICJ case concerning allegations of genocide against the Rohingya people in Myanmar.
Tremendous pressure
By awarding the prize to one of the staunchest advocates of international law, accountability and the rules-based international order, the Nobel committee has drawn attention to the importance of the institutions that uphold these principles. The Chair of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, Jørgen Watne Frydnes, put it plainly: ‘The institutions that uphold international law are under tremendous pressure, sanctions, and attack. In the world we are living in with more conflict than in a long time, supporting, strengthening and also expanding the work of these institutions are key to a more peaceful world.’ By choosing a person rather than an institution, the Committee highlighted the people whose work sustains international justice, at a time when the institutions responsible for this work face mounting pressure.
The recognition of international law, and of the individuals who risk their own security to defend it, is especially meaningful at this time. Within hours of the announcement, the Trump administration imposed sanctions on the ICC as an institution. These go beyond the individual designations of prosecutors and judges in place since February 2025, and form part of a campaign to ‘dismantle’ the Court, in Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s words, ‘brick by brick’.
The new measures are due to take effect after a six-month period, which the US administration has presented as an opportunity for the court’s member states to address its concerns. The announcement nevertheless marks a further escalation in the pressure on the ICC.
A wider crisis
Beyond attacks against the ICC, multilateralism itself is in retreat. While sanctions attract headlines, the United Nations is also facing a major financial crisis, and thousands of staff have been laid off across the system. The crisis stems chiefly from the United States withholding most of its assessed contributions and China making late payments. China, backed by Russia, has also sought to cut human rights posts in UN budget negotiations.
The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, which Navi Pillay led from 2008 to 2014, cut the number of human rights missions it conducted from 11,000 in 2024 to 5,000 in 2025. Many teams conducting independent investigations into conflicts in Afghanistan, Palestine, Myanmar and the Democratic Republic of the Congo are working with severely reduced staffing and funding.
Meanwhile, the world is experiencing the highest number of armed conflicts since 1946. Protections afforded by international humanitarian law, enshrined in widely ratified treaties, are increasingly treated as optional. International law is also being obscured, misused and weaponised to justify actions that undermine the very principles it is meant to uphold.
Against this backdrop, the Nobel Peace Prize is a reminder that justice is not an abstraction. It depends on people and institutions that need support and protection to do their work. It also depends on states not only respecting the law themselves, but taking action when it is violated. Nobody is safer when the institutions built to hold power to account are dismantled.
A legacy of peace through law
This moment evokes a historical parallel. In 1911, Tobias M.C. Asser shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Alfred Fried. Asser was recognised for his role as co-founder of the Institut de droit international, initiator of the Hague Conferences on Private International Law, and a pioneer in international legal relations.
He also played a key role in establishing the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA), one of the earliest global mechanisms for the peaceful settlement of international disputes. The PCA continues to operate today, helping to sustain the aspiration to resolve disputes through law and international cooperation. The institutions that followed, including the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the ICC, reflect the continuing ambition to make international law a foundation for peace.
That ambition lives on in the international institutions based in and around The Hague, including the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals, successor to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda; the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons; the Kosovo Specialist Chambers and Specialist Prosecutor’s Office; the ICJ; the ICC; and the International Commission on Missing Persons.
Challenging and examining the law
Tobias Asser’s legacy lies not only in the institutions he helped establish, but also in the recognition that international justice must be sustained by people who understand, scrutinise and strengthen these institutions. Pillay’s Nobel Peace Prize honours this kind of commitment, at a time when courts face sanctions, human rights bodies face budget cuts, and the language of international law is bent to excuse its breach.
The legacy of Tobias M.C. Asser is therefore not simply a part of our history. It is reflected in our work today and in our mission to contribute to the development of international and European public and private law. Through independent research, professional training and a forum for debate in The Hague, we examine, challenge and strengthen the law on which international institutions depend. In doing so, we contribute to the people, institutions and legal frameworks that seek to uphold international justice and cooperation.
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[Interview] What US sanctions against the ICC mean for international justice
US sanctions targeting the International Criminal Court are raising wider questions about the resilience of international criminal justice and international law. Asser Institute researchers James Patrick Sexton and Christophe Paulussen discuss what the sanctions mean, why they reach far beyond the US, and what happens when states themselves weaken the system they are meant to uphold. “The main issue today is that states often fail to realise they are the enforcement backbone of international law. Through their action or inaction, they either uphold the system or erode it.” An interview. Read more.
