Imagine playing a game of monopoly, but with some players being allowed to cheat, skip rent, ignore the rules, and even overturn other players’ turns. No matter how skillfully others play, the outcome is rigged. It is like playing a game where the rules only apply to the weak, meanwhile the powerful bend or walk away. This has become the reality of the International Criminal Court (ICC). While the ICC was established to end impunity for the world’s most serious crimes such as genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, its ability to prosecute criminals is undermined by powerful states (Zamani, 2025, 10). As a result, its justice system allegedly looks good in theory, yet in practice it is the most powerful states who escape the consequences while the weaker states have to face it. This potentially creates a bias which leads to the outcome that ICC has selective justice. Rather than holding individuals accountable by transcending borders, the ICC supposedly is not able to deliver justice as it’s undermined by the very states that helped create it. Therefore, this blog explores how powerful states are reputedly able protect their citizens from prosecution through three strategies: by not being a party to the Rome Statute (Abmos, 1999, p. 1), by using political influence such as UNSC to block cases (Trahan, 2013, 435), and by rejecting the ICC’s legitimacy (Reuters, 2023).