In 2025, 32,000 Palestinians were forcibly displaced from three refugee camps in the West Bank, according to Human Rights Watch, which described the expulsions as war crimes and crimes against humanity. A newly expanded UK sanctions regime gives the government a tool it did not have before: the power to impose targeted measures on people and organizations involved in war crimes.
Parliament approved the expansion yesterday. The change broadens the UK’s Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime, first adopted in 2020. Under the earlier rules, the government could sanction people for certain grave abuses involving the right to life, freedom from torture, and freedom from slavery and forced labor. It can now also target those responsible for serious violations of international humanitarian law, blocking humanitarian aid, and violations of the right to liberty and security.
Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband announced the change in September while setting out measures related to Israel’s unlawful settlement expansion in the West Bank. But the new powers are not limited to that conflict. They can be used against individuals and entities responsible for war crimes anywhere in the world.
Human Rights Watch has urged governments to investigate people and organizations involved in serious abuses and consider targeted sanctions. The group points to examples in several conflicts. In Sudan, it found that the Abu Dhabi-based Global Security Services Group, owned and run by Mohamed Hamdan al-Zaabi, apparently hired Colombian military contractors to fight alongside the Rapid Support Forces. The contractors were deployed in El Fasher, where the RSF committed mass atrocities, the group said.
In the Democratic Republic of Congo, Human Rights Watch reported that M23 and Rwandan forces forcibly recruited and detained thousands of people, including children, and subjected them to abuse in so-called training camps. It identified Rwanda Defense Force Special Force Commander Stanislas Gashugi and M23 commanders Léon Kanyamibwa and Bertin Masozera as responsible. In the West Bank, the group has called for sanctions on officials including Defense Minister Israel Katz and Maj. Gen. Avi Bluth over the displacement from the three refugee camps.
The new authority could let the UK act against those named in these cases, but sanctions are not a substitute for criminal trials. They can be used to put pressure on people linked to ongoing abuses and help bring them to an end. Those affected must also have a fair way to challenge sanctions. For international crimes, past or present, criminal justice and fair trials remain essential.
The expansion gives Britain a wider set of options, but its value will depend on how it uses them. Human Rights Watch says the government should apply the rules consistently, wherever atrocities occur and whoever is responsible, while also ensuring that its justice system can investigate and prosecute war crimes. The next test is whether the new powers are used in a principled way to help stop abuses and support accountability.