Ukraine said on Tuesday that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) should order Russia to pay damages for a “war of extermination”, saying international law itself was in danger.
“Russia is not above the law. It must be brought to justice,” Ukraine’s top representative, Anton Korynevich, told the court, sitting a few meters from his Russian opponents at the Peace Palace in The Hague .
“You have the power to declare that Russia’s actions are illegal, that its continued violations must stop, that your orders must be carried out, and that Russia must pay damages,” he told the judges.
Ukraine submitted Russia to the ICJ just days after the February 24, 2022 invasion, seeking to fight its aggressive neighbor on all fronts, legal and diplomatic, as well as military.
Kiev’s argument is that Russian President Vladimir Putin cited an alleged “genocide” against the pro-Russian population in eastern Ukraine as one of the reasons Moscow invaded the neighboring country.
According to Ukraine, this is an abuse of the 1948 UN Genocide Convention, signed by both kyiv and Moscow.
“Is it really possible for a State to abuse the Genocide Convention to justify a war of conquest?” – asked A. Korynevičius. – For the good of the world, the answer must be “no”, so that international law is not distorted and transformed into a tool for the violation and destruction of human rights. »
In a preliminary ruling issued in March last year, the ICJ sided with Ukraine and ordered Russia to immediately end the invasion.
However, Russia challenged the decision, arguing that the ICJ did not have the legal authority to rule on the case.
“Russia’s challenge is also an attack on the authority of this court. Every missile that Russia launches into our cities, it launches in defiance of this court,” said A. Korynevičius.
Currently, hearings at the Maison de la Paix are focused on whether the ICJ has jurisdiction over this issue.
The ICC was created to resolve disputes between parties, but it is not known for its speed of work. It is likely that the court will need several months just to decide whether or not it can hear the case. His decisions are binding, even if he has no means to enforce them.
Source: The Delfi
