Ukraine, with the support of the European Union (EU), plans to seek UN member states to legitimize the creation of a special court to try an alleged Russian crime of aggression against the neighboring country.
The EU ambassador to the United Nations, Olof Skoog, explained that with Ukraine they are seeking the UN to legitimize the creation of a special court to judge Russia’s war crimes, something that he admitted in any case is “quite complicated” from the point of view of from a legal point of view.
The European Commission (EC) presented on Wednesday to the capitals of the community bloc a series of proposals to ensure that Russia is held accountable for “atrocities” and “crimes” committed in the war in Ukraine, including the possibility of creating a special and independent court to prosecute the “crime of aggression”.
Today, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov assured that Russia will not accept tribunals proposed by the West.
“Regarding the attempts to establish some type of courts, these will not have any legitimacy, we will not accept them and we will condemn them”he stated in his daily press conference.
Skoog noted that the EU is in talks with Ukraine on this issue and that the idea is to seek some kind of backing from the UN.
Asked about it, United Nations spokesman Stéphane Dujarric stressed that any decision in this area is in the hands of the member states and does not correspond to the Secretary General, António Guterres.
Since Russia has veto power in the Security Council, if the initiative goes aheadMost likely, kyiv and its allies will have to resort to the United Nations General Assembly, where they have already passed several condemnations against Moscow with overwhelming majorities, irrelevant because the Assembly’s resolutions carry less weight.
Before arriving at such a move, Skoog stressed that the Twenty-seven will need to take the matter up among themselves to decide how to proceed, a discussion that is expected in mid-December.
Today, in addition, the high representative of the European Union (EU) for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, announced that he will promote the creation of a special court to prosecute war crimes in Ukraine.
To “create a new security order in Europe”Borrell assured that he will put on the table “first of the EU”, and then from other countries, “the proposal to support the Ukrainian prosecutor’s office” to accumulate evidence of war crimes committed by Russia and the creation of a special court to deal with these crimes.