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Ukraine has joined the ICC but has asked for its military to be temporarily exempt from jurisdiction.
Yaroslav Zheleznyak, a member of the Kyiv parliament, said on Telegram on Wednesday that 281 deputies voted to approve the so-called Rome Statute of the Criminal Court. One vote was against and 22 abstained.
Ukraine signed the Rome Statute in January 2000 but has not yet ratified it. The statute is the basis for the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. The court hears cases including genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Seven years of denial of war crimes
However, the document now adopted stipulates that Ukraine does not recognize the jurisdiction of the Criminal Court for War Crimes over Ukrainian citizens for seven years. The background is that the army is worried that its actions against Russian troops could be charged with war crimes in certain cases. The military conflict has been going on not only since 2022, but also since 2014, when Russian troops first appeared in Donbass.
To this end, Kyiv explained that requests for cooperation from the ICC can be made through diplomatic channels or directly to the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office or the Ministry of Justice.
The Rome Statute will not enter into force for several weeks.
Due to complex deadlines, the Rome Statute will enter into force for Ukraine in a few weeks. So far, 124 states have ratified it and 139 countries have signed it. Russia and the United States have signed it but have not yet ratified it.
Among other things, the ICC has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is accused of being responsible for the deportation of Ukrainian children. Like the United States, Russia is not a party to the ICC.
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