UN official targeted by Donald Trump finds herself on terrorist list, forced to live an ‘unjust, unfair, and persecutorial’ existence

Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur for Palestine, is currently facing the incredibly serious fallout of sanctions imposed by President Trump, finding herself placed on the U.S. Treasury Department’s Specially Designated Nationals list right alongside suspected al Qaeda terrorists and drug traffickers. According to Reuters, the consequences have been swift and harsh. 

Albanese’s US assets are frozen, her bank accounts are closed, her credit cards are canceled, and she has been forced to borrow cards from friends just to travel. She has received physical threats, forcing the UN to increase security for her and her family. Speaking from her native Italy, Albanese stated, “This is unjust, unfair, and persecutorial.” She firmly believes she is being punished solely because of her human rights work.

Last spring, Albanese sent confidential letters to over a dozen major American companies, including Alphabet, Amazon, Caterpillar, Microsoft, and Lockheed Martin, and two charities. They were warned that as part of a UN report, they were being scrutinized for potentially “contributing to gross violations of human rights” by Israel in Gaza and the West Bank. These letters clearly alarmed the firms, causing at least two to go straight to the White House for help.

Yep, they went crying to their ‘parent’

The Trump administration quickly hit back, imposing sanctions on Albanese for “writing threatening letters” and urging the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate. The U.S. State Department spokesperson claimed Albanese made “extreme and unfounded accusations” in her correspondence. They made it clear that the U.S. “will not tolerate these campaigns of political and economic warfare.”

The move against Albanese was part of an executive order that Trump used to sanction ICC staff. This campaign began when the ICC indicted Trump’s ally, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and is intended to shield the president and his officials from any future accountability for U.S. military actions abroad. The targeting of a UN-mandated expert and so many ICC staff, marks a major break from past U.S. policy and indicates what Trump thinks of the UN. 

Nancy Combs, an international law professor, noted that the sanctions are a clear effort to “really kneecap an institution that the Trump administration has always been opposed to.” She added that this fits into the administration’s “much larger worldview that Americans benefit when not constrained by a bunch of namby-pamby international norms.”

Margaret Satterthwaite, another UN special rapporteur, called the precedent dangerous, saying, “It’s shocking that someone’s human rights work could be seen as so dangerous that they would be thought of as akin to a terrorist.” However, despite all this pressure, Albanese is resolved to continue her mission. The ICC, which continues to investigate war crimes, vows to “continue providing justice and hope to millions of innocent victims of atrocities across the world.”