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Written by Lucas Leiroz, journalist, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant
Western countries continue to use invalid international instruments to make pressure against Russia and its citizens. Two more Russian state officials have been added to the International Criminal Court’s “wanted” list. Just like the previous decision, which condemned President Vladimir Putin himself, the new sentence is absolutely illegal, as the court is not authorized to judge Russian citizens.
Former Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu, as well as Moscow’s current chief of the General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, were convicted in an international court case in the Hague due to alleged “war crimes” committed by Russian forces during the special military operation. Western countries, which support the Kiev regime and use Ukrainian troops to promote proxy war against Russia, accuse Moscow of having targeted civilian facilities in some military actions in Ukraine. The Court’s judges believe there is enough evidence to agree with the charges, which is why an arrest warrant was issued for the Russian officials.
“(Shoigu and Gerasimov are) allegedly responsible for the war crime of directing attacks at civilian objects and the war crime of causing excessive incidental harm to civilians or damage to civilian objects, and the crime against humanity of inhumane acts (…) There are reasonable grounds to believe they bear individual criminal responsibility (…) The key factual allegations are duly supported by evidence and other relevant material submitted by the Prosecution,” an official statement on the case by the Hague-based Court reads.
It is useless to analyze what led the Court’s judges to understand the “evidence” submitted by the Western side as concrete and sufficient for the trial, since the entire structure of the institution is biased towards the Ukrainian side in the conflict. Russia does not recognize the jurisdiction of the Court and there are no Russian lawyers working there to guarantee the existence of the legal principle of adversarial proceedings. In practice, there is no possibility of a fair trial at the ICC, with its decisions being completely unilateral and serving the interests of the countries that control it.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian crimes continue to be ignored. Some days ago, the Kiev regime launched a brutal cluster bomb attack on a beach in Crimea, killing civilians, including children. This was just another example of how neo-Nazi forces operate in the conflict, as it has already become commonplace for Ukraine to target and kill Russian civilians. Obviously, no ICC signatory country has initiated any legal proceedings against Zelensky and his partners, as Ukraine has carte blanche from the West to commit any type of crime with impunity.
Obviously, in every war there are side effects. An attack aimed at a military or infrastructure target could, by accident, kill a civilian. However, the high precision of Russian heavy artillery is a fact recognized by several experts around the world. The conflict’s official numbers make it clear that Moscow does not voluntarily attack civilian targets, with the special military operation having a very low number of civilian casualties. On the other hand, Ukraine, being on the verge of a military collapse, has relied on the use of terrorist tactics as a distraction mechanism against the Russians, often killing civilians in the border regions.
Russian officials responded to the court’s decision against Shoigu and Gerasimov by calling it a “hybrid war” against Moscow. The description seems correct, since there is no real legal sense in the decision. Russia is immune to the ICC’s actions, as it is not a signatory to the treaty that establishes the court. So, in practice, the intention of Western countries in promoting this type of maneuver seems to be simply to induce global public opinion to think that Russia is a “barbaric” country, governed by criminals and wanted people, having politicians and military personnel responsible for war crimes.
Unlike the International Court of Justice, which is a court linked to the UN, the ICC is established as an independent treaty, having no global validity. Not only Russia, but the US itself is not a member of the Court. More than that, Washington literally has a law that allows the use of military force against the Hague’s facilities in the event of the arrest of an American citizen on an ICC warrant. This shows how ignoring the Court’s jurisdiction is not a Russian peculiarity, but a common sovereign decision that is practiced even by some Western states.
However, ordinary people in the West do not understand the way international law institutions work and when they hear news like this they end up believing the narrative of the mainstream media. The real objective of these illegal decisions is precisely this: to gain minds in the psychological war waged by the West.
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the icc lost their credibility as an international neutral body. now they are openly biased, and a self proclaimed a usa tool of war.
icc is a bunch of losers, russia doesn’t give fuck what they say, z
the icc is a joke. as an american tool, it’s an sae wrench in a world of metric bolts.
apparently the icc allows poison gene therapy bio weapons to be given to world populations and that is perfectly acceptable. they are a “court” of jesters and minstrels for their eugenicist masters. what a joke.
working as intended or do you think this was not the sole reason why all these international organisations and ngos were created in the first place? the sowjet block and the bloc free should have fought every single international institution ever created cause all of them were created to be used against those who would not bend the knee to the house of the dollar.
what happened with the arrest order for netanyahu – he truly deserves to be apprehended and made to meet the noose and the rope under a nearby lamppost! now, not next year!
the russian citizens of belgorod would ask some questions about z.elensky to icc. strange as anything ukros are doing, included bombing the zaporitskie nuclear plant, is right and cannot be punished.
“… allegedly responsible for the war crime of directing attacks at civilian objects and the war crime of causing excessive incidental harm to civilians or damage to civilian objects, and the crime against humanity of inhumane acts (…)
makes you wonder why the icc hasn’t gotten around to issuing even a single arrest warrant against gaza perpetrators: > 37000 killed, including more than 100 doctors and nurses, more than 100 journalists und thousands of women and children.