The International Center for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine was a new step in international efforts to hold Russian authorities accountable for their war against Ukraine last year, which led to the deadliest conflict in Europe since the World War II.
The center had its office at the headquarters of the European Union agency for judicial cooperation.
Ukraine’s Attorney General Andriy Kostin said in a statement that the opening was “a clear sign that the world is united and stands firm on the path of holding the Russian regime accountable for all its crimes.”
“Unfortunately, there is a huge accountability gap for the crime of aggression in the framework of international criminal justice,” he added.
The initiative is funded by the European Commission, the EU executive, which on Monday approved an initial batch of 8.3 million euros ($9 million) in financial support.
The International Criminal Court is investigating crimes in Ukraine and has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin, accusing him of criminal responsibility for the kidnapping of Ukrainian children.
ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan welcomed the inauguration, saying there was no hope of accountability “unless the evidence is preserved, unless it is collected, unless it is well understood.”
The ICC does not have jurisdiction to prosecute the aggression against Ukraine because neither Russia nor Ukraine have ratified the Rome Statute that founded the court.
Kostin said kyiv plans to join the court’s 123 member states.
“I hope it gets ratified sooner rather than later,” he said. “Our country is ready to do it. The only question is when the parliament will be able to vote on it”.
The United States is also not part of the ICC, although it supports international efforts to seek justice in Ukraine. A newly appointed special prosecutor for the Crime of Assault, Jessica Kim, will represent Washington at the new center in The Hague.
Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Polite Jr. told reporters that the US government had released a first batch of evidence to an international database on crimes in Ukraine.
“They will not be the last ones we will give,” he added. He declined to go into detail about the nature of the tests.
Kostin said that the Ukrainian prosecutor’s office has already identified more than 600 people in absentia suspected of involvement in the crime of assault, and filed charges against 312 of them.
As countries around the world work together to prepare the cases, it is unclear where they would train. Ukraine wants an international court to be formed, while others, like the United States, favor a court framed in the Ukrainian legal system but with elements of international law.
Despite those differences, Kostin said the countries involved in the new center are united in their efforts to seek justice for the attack.
“If the crime of aggression had not been committed, there would not be another 93,000 incidents of war crimes,” he said.
FUENTE: Associated Press
