The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants this Tuesday against Sergei Shoigu, former Russian Defense Minister, and General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the military General Staff, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated during the invasion of Ukraine. The judges consider that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the two are responsible for the missile attacks carried out by Russian troops against civilians and against Ukrainian electrical infrastructure. The events took place “from October 10, 2022 to at least March 9, 2023,” the arrest warrant indicates.
In the reasoning for the order, the Pre-Trial Chamber of the ICC recalls that one of the objectives of international humanitarian law is the protection of civilians in armed conflicts. After analyzing the conduct of Shoigu and Gerasimov, the court in The Hague has concluded that “there are reasonable grounds to believe that the suspects intended to cause great suffering or serious injury to physical integrity or mental or physical health,” the civilians.
The CFI keeps the content of this type of orders secret to protect both witnesses and the investigations carried out by the Prosecutor’s Office in Ukraine. However, the Chamber has considered that making them public “can contribute to preventing the commission of new crimes” in view of the fact that “conduct similar to those addressed appears to be ongoing.” [en Ucrania].
This May, Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed Shoigu (69 years old), who had been at the head of Defense for a decade. The former minister planned and executed the invasion of Ukraine, but went from having Putin’s trust to being singled out for the lack of progress in the conflict. He was governor of the Moscow region, and the annexation of Crimea — in February 2014 — cemented his career.
Valery Gerasimov (68 years old) was appointed in January 2023 commander-in-chief of the Russian forces operating in what they call a “special military operation” in Ukraine. In 2014, his name was added to the European Union’s sanctions list for the massive deployment of Russian troops on the border of the neighboring country. In December of last year, the general claimed that the United States had “knowingly destroyed all arms control agreements to inflict strategic defeat on Russia.” He said this during a meeting with military attachés from foreign embassies in Moscow.
The destruction of Ukraine’s energy network
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In 2022, a wave of attacks on Ukraine’s energy grid left hundreds of thousands of citizens without power and caused numerous water outages. The country’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, then estimated that 30% of the power plants had been destroyed. In October – the month indicated in the arrest warrant – a massive assault of this nature began, described as a war crime by the Ukrainian Government. The blackouts also left the hospitals in the affected municipalities without supply, and the damage reached the gas network and the plants that fuel the thermal power plants with coal.
Russia is not a member of the ICC, rejects its jurisdiction and refuses to hand over any of its citizens to international justice. In 2023, the same court ordered the arrest of Putin himself for his alleged responsibility in the forced deportation of thousands of Ukrainian minors from the occupied territories to Russia. It is considered a war crime, and the same court is seeking Maria Lvova-Belova, the Kremlin’s commissioner for children’s rights, for that crime. The Ukrainian Government has documented the forced transfer of some 20,000 children and adolescents since the start of the Russian military invasion in February 2022. According to Ukrainian authorities, they are handed over to Russian families and stripped of their identity and nationality. Moscow denies this and says it has protected them by keeping them out of the war.
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