The Russian President is wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague. The foundations for this were laid with the special tribunals on Rwanda and Yugoslavia.
The Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court , Karim Khan (middle), in the Ukrainian Bucha
Suddenly there he was: Ratko Mladic in court in The Hague in the summer of 2011 after more than a decade on the run. The later found guilty Bosnian Serb ex-general responsible for the siege of Sarajevo and also for the Srebrenica massacre of more than 8000 Bosniak boys and men in July 1995 during the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
The The tribunal was founded 30 years ago by UN Resolution 827 of May 25, 1992. It completed the last criminal proceedings in 2017, when 84 of the 161 accused were convicted, including Mladic.
He was only separated by a bulletproof glass pane from the small auditorium of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). His every move was observed from there: by the founders of the Women of Srebrenica association, whose husbands and sons had been murdered by Mladic's Bosnian Serb soldiers.
War criminal Mladic: The Bosnian-Serb ex-general was finally sentenced to life imprisonment in 2021
You and other relatives of the victims kept coming to The Hague: whether for the trial of Mladic or the former president of the Bosnian Serb Republic, Radovan Karadzic, or against the former President of Serbia, Slobodan Milosevic, who was on trial from 2002 until his death while in custody in 2006.
Victims and perpetrators in the courtroom
The encounter of victims, in the visitors' room or as witnesses in the courtroom, with the alleged perpetrators was at the core of the legal processing of the crimes during the wars of disintegration in the former Yugoslavia from 1991 to 1995. Perpetrators and victims on an equal footing: “It was positively surprising how many people, for example, in the case of sexual offences, women and men, were willing to make precise statements in far-off Den Haag,” German lawyer Wolfgang Schomburg told DW. “And it was probably a relief for those who could testify to be able to look the alleged perpetrator in the eye for the court at the time.”
Women of Srebrenica: The relatives of the victims will follow the final verdict against Mladic in 2021
This also applies to the International Criminal Court for Rwanda, which was founded a year later and convicted 62 perpetrators of the Hutu genocide against the Tutsi. Up to a million people were killed in Rwanda between the spring and summer of 1994.
Pioneers in International Justice
Wolfgang Schomburg was the first judge from Germany at the ICTY and one who also judged at the Rwanda tribunal. In an interview with DW, he emphasizes the importance of the two ad hoc tribunals founded three decades ago – for the establishment of the International Criminal Court (ICC), which is also based in The Hague.
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Wolfgang Schomburg in The Hague in 2001 (second from left) next to longtime chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte
The ICC recently issued an arrest warrant against Russian President Vladimir Putin for allegedly illegal kidnapping of Ukrainian children. “Everything the ICC does would not be possible without the preliminary work of these two tribunals,” says Schomburg. “The two ad hoc tribunals have shown that, given the political will, it is possible to hold those most responsible, including presidents and leaders of a state or region, accountable.”
“Putin an internationally wanted war criminal”
That also applies to Russian President Putin, said Schomburg. “The evidence seems to be good in relation to the abduction of children.” But the German lawyer goes even further: “I see overwhelming evidence based on the public statements we are all familiar with regarding the question of whether those responsible in Russia are guilty of genocide or the extermination of Ukraine as a crime against humanity. can be held accountable.” “The Russian war of aggression against Ukraine is about destroying a political or ethnic group and destroying an entire people or an entire nation.” And he sees that as a given with the start of the Russian war of aggression on February 24, 2022.
The member of the Bundestag Boris Mijatovic calls for the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court to be strengthened – 30 years after the founding of the Yugoslavia tribunal
Schomburg believes that the arrest warrant issued by the ICC's chief prosecutor, Britain's Karim Khan, is already having an effect: “Even because Putin hardly left the country at first and only appeared virtually; also the many statements from Moscow that an arrest warrant doesn't mean anything and that they are now even working with warrants against Kahn and the judges who issued the warrant.” And: “On the basis of an arrest warrant issued by independent judges from a global community, anyone can say that Mr. Putin is an internationally wanted war criminal,” says the lawyer.
Ukraine: Dispute over jurisdiction
< p>In a DW interview, Schomburg backed the ICC. That seems necessary because politically it is highly controversial whether the criminal court should take over the legal processing of Russia's war against Ukraine. To date, the US has not signed the court's charter, nor has Russia.
The Latvian Justice Minister Inese Lībiņa-Egnere is one of the ICC critics. She calls for a Ukraine special tribunal without the participation of international lawyers in The Hague. “We are now at a point where everyone understands that we need it,” Lībiņa-Egnere told DW. “I am more than confident that we will reach this result.”
Putin: video conference held Airplane. Hardly any travel since the arrest warrant
The problem: International support for the ICC is weak. Especially with the most important allegation against Russia's leadership, the aggressive war against Ukraine, which violates international law. Because “of the 130 member states of the ICC, only a few, around 45, have ratified the extension of Article 8bis, the criminal offense of the crime of aggression,” says German member of the Bundestag Boris Mijatovic. And that is also due to the USA: Washington has always rejected responsibility – otherwise the 2003 war against Iraq could have been negotiated in The Hague. Mijatovic is calling for the so-called Rome Statute, which regulates the work of the ICC, to be changed. “We should adjust international criminal law again so that it is sufficient that the attacked state is a member of the Rome Statute and not the attacker too.”
Moscow's leadership in court
The German one International law expert Wolfgang Schomburg believes that the discussions about a Ukraine tribunal should “put obstacles in the way of the ICC”. But he is convinced of the jurisdiction of the court. If only because the countries of the Global South, many of which support the ICC, do not want to finance a subsidiary court, says Schomburg. He believes that Putin or Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will one day be in The Hague. “It will happen like with the other leaders that we have held accountable at the ICTY and the Rwanda tribunal,” says Schomburg. “They will end up in court.”