<
https://www.irishtimes.com/world/us/2025/12/12/its-surreal-us-sanctions-lock-international-criminal-court-judge-out-of-daily-life/>
"This summer Kimberly Prost, a Canadian judge at the International Criminal
Court (ICC), arrived at her home in The Hague and, as was her habit, called out
“Alexa”.
There was silence. The voice-activated assistant did not respond. “Alexa was
dead. She wouldn’t talk to me,” Prost recalled in an interview with
The Irish
Times.
Prost had been added to the United States’ sanctions list, because in 2020 she
ruled to authorise an investigation into possible atrocities in Afghanistan,
including by US troops. Amazon, obliged to implement the sanctions as a US
company, had cancelled her account.
It was just the start of what Prost describes as a “pervasive, negative effect”
of the sanctions across all aspects of her life, which has shut her out from
much of the international banking system.
The effects of being sanctioned are wide-ranging.
“You immediately lose your credit cards – it doesn’t matter where they were
issued or by what bank,” Prost said. Bank transfers can be challenging: a sum
of money she tried to send a young couple as a wedding gift has been lost in
the system for weeks.
“Online shopping becomes excruciatingly difficult, if not impossible. But
there’s other things, everyday things, like ordering an Uber or ordering
tickets for something, or booking a hotel.”
“If you have assets in the United States, then they’re frozen,” Prost said. “If
you have family or family who works there, visits there, there’s a real danger.
One of my colleagues, her daughter’s visa was revoked.”"
Via Violet Blue’s
Threat Model - Cybersecurity: January 6, 2026
https://www.patreon.com/posts/cybersecurity-6-147538800
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
