Above photo: People protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza as the conflict between Israel and Hamas continues, at the headquarters of the International Criminal Court (ICC) on October 18, 2023. Piroschka van de Wouw/Reuters.
These past thirty years, the proponents of the Unipolar World have proceeded to methodically dismantle the norms, principles and diplomatic usages to such an extent that contemporary international relations are characterized by social media postings.
First, UN resolutions have been construed to provide a veneer of legality to wars of choice against UN Member-States such as Yugoslavia, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen.
These gross violations of AA 2(4) of the UN Charter proceeded out of a deliberate intent to shirk the core principles of the UN Charter such as respect for national sovereignty and the peaceful resolution of international disputes.
In order to manufacture consent, the West then proceeded to subvert UN mechanism such as the Agency for the Control of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Organization of Security and Cooperation of Europe (OSCE).
The OPCW and the IAEA thus produced reports to justify armed intervention while the OSCE abandoned all pretense of neutrality.
Finally, diplomatic processes such as the Minsk Accords and the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), (UN Resolutions 2202 & 2231), were devised as schemes to respectively allow Ukraine to build up its armed forces in anticipation of military operations against its own population and deceive the Islamic Republic of Iran into surrendering its sovereign right to enrich unranium in the context of its civil nuclear program.
International justice has failed
At the level of international institutions tasked with the administration of justice, the Nuremberg Principles have been weaponized against the enemies of the West rather than against those responsible for crimes against peace, this ignoring Chief Justice Robert Jackson’s warnings made during his opening statement at the Nuremberg Trials.
In so doing, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has engaged in selective prosecution since its inception.
In Ukraine, the court most notably failed to open an investigation into the actions allegedly carried out in the eastern parts of the country by Battalions acting under the control and supervision of Ukraine’s former Interior Minister Arsen Avakov.
These Battalions were eventually reintegrated in the regular armed forces under the command and control of Ukrainian successive Supreme Commanders-in-Chief Valery Zaluzhny and Oleksandr Syrsky. Under their responsibility, scores of Russian civilians were subjected to torture, summary execution and arbitrary detention both in the New Regions and later in Russia’s Kursk Oblast.
These two individuals served under Post-Maidan presidents Piotr Poroshenko and Volodymir Zelenskyy who both owe Victoria Nuland and former US ambassador, Jeffrey Pyatt a debt of gratitude for their rise to power following the 2014 Coup d’état.
Another high profile individual who has visited Kiev on a regular basis to meet with Ukraine’s all powerful intelligence Chief, Kirill Budanov is former National Security Adviser and Hillary Clinton protege, Jake Sullivan.
Like clockwork, Sullivan was in Kiev a few days prior to the Crocus City Hall Bombing on March 22, 2024.
Budanov is currently subjected to an international arrest warrant on account of his alleged participation in a criminal conspiracy leading to the bombing of the Kerch Bridge on October 8th, 2022.
Of note, crimes against peace do not entail the use of violence. François Hollande and Angela Merkel by never intending to fulfill their obligations to serve as guarantors of the defunct Minsk Agreements, contributed to the collapse of the diplomatic track and the advent of armed conflict. Boris Johnson explicity flew to Kiev to scuttle the adoption of the just-concluded Istanbul agreement at the early stage of the conflict.
Inertia at the ICJ
The momentum generated by the Russian Federation’s filing of a 522-page report bearing on acts allegedly committed by Ukraine against ethnic Russians seemed to have brought the proceedings initiated by Kiev against Moscow to a grinding halt.
Kiev in a curious twist had predicated the thrust of their argument on the premise that by falsely justifying its military actions in Ukraine on the existence of a threat of genocide committed by Kiev, Moscow was in violation of its obligations to abide by the Convention on the Prohibition on Genocide.
Doubling down
On May 9, 2025, while Moscow was commemorating with its allies in the Global South the 80th Anniversary of its victory against Nazi Germany, the European Union announced in Orwellian fashion that to mark “Europe Day”, it was proud to announce the creation of its own Special Tribunal.
What’s next for the Russian Federation?
The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation has been meticulously documenting violations of the laws of war allegedly carried out by members of the Ukraine in the context of the Special Military Operation.
At the civil society level, a Commission of Inquiry composed of foreign journalists and activists (the so-called International Public Tribunal) has collected statements from survivors and witnesses bearing on alleged exactions committed by the Ukraine Armed Forces.
Serving as its director since 2022, Maxim Grigoriev first set out to document crimes committed against ethnic Russians living in Ukraine soon after the Maidan Coup d’etat of 2014. He has since published a series of books chronicling what began as his own personal initiative while appearing as a frequent speaker on various State-sponsored platforms.
Whatever one might be tempted to believe as relates to the forsaking of international law in favor of power politics these past thirty years, it would behoove Russia not to follow down this path of illegality.
As such, in judging alleged perpetrators of war crimes and other associated violations of the laws of war, Moscow should avoid a repeat of the sham trial carried out in Iraq under the supervision of US occupying troops. At stake is Moscow’s own reputation in the global arena.
Having ceased to be a party to the European Convention on Human Rights, it is of paramount importance that in the context of future proceedings, Russia afford the accused a fair trial consistent with the principles announced in AA 14 of the International Covenant on Political and Social rights, AA 10 & 11 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the positions of the International Law Commission as well as jurisprudential decisions at international customary law.
Failure to abide to these standards will lead future trials to be characterized as war crimes.
