THE HAGUE: A Malaysian lawyer working at the International Criminal Court has accused Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan of non-consensual sexual contact, in her first public media appearance on a CNN interview aired on Thursday (July 16).
According to The Guardian, The woman who was only identified as Sarah, is a Malaysian Muslim who has worked at the ICC since 2017 and previously served as a direct assistant to Khan.
She repeated her allegations that Khan had non-consensual sexual contact with her, telling CNN he had shown escalating behaviour of touching and groping her.
She recounted a time she said he touched her intimately while she was pretending to be asleep.
"There is no way for something to be consensual when you have such a power disparity," she told CNN.
Khan, 56, denies any wrongdoing.
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His lawyer, Sareta Ashraph, told CNN he denies "any form of sexual contact, relationship, consensual or non-consensual" with Sarah.
Khan's lawyers did not immediately respond to Reuters' request for comment.
Sarah would not comment on the ICC's ongoing investigations into Khan.
Diplomats running the ICC's oversight body have decided Khan did have an inappropriate sexual relationship with a junior staff member and should be fired, according to documents seen by Reuters.
The court's 125 member states are set to vote on Friday (July 24) on a proposal to dismiss him over the alleged sexual misconduct.
Khan's supporters say he has become a political target for seeking arrest warrants in 2024 for Israeli officials over the war in Gaza.
In the interview, Sarah denied online rumours that she worked for Israel's Mossad spy agency, saying she underwent extensive security checks in order to work closely with Khan and his predecessor.
"If ever there was even a hint of suspicion that I was a state agent of any kind, I would have been dismissed," she said. - Reuters
