The Palestinians are not eligible to join the International Criminal Court, a senior US official said on Thursday after the UN accepted a Palestinian request to adhere to the tribunal.
“The United States does not believe that the State of Palestine qualifies as a sovereign State and does not recognize it as such and does not believe that it is eligible to accede to the Rome statute” under which the ICC was set up, said State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki. She also stressed that the US administration would comply with the law on funding the Palestinians, amid new moves in Congress to freeze about USD 440 million in annual aid if the Palestinian Authority seeks to join the court.