Duda made the appeal on Tuesday during an online summit of Core Group leaders on the establishment of such a body.
Marek Borawski/KPRP
Andrzej Duda, the Polish president, has appealed for “every possible effort to establish a Special Tribunal” to deal with Russian war crimes in Ukraine.
He made the appeal on Tuesday during an online summit of Core Group leaders on the establishment of such a body.
“Justice is justice and all Russian crimes must be investigated, judged and punished,” Duda said in his address published on the Polish President’s Office website.
According to Duda, “this special tribunal” has to be a competent body with a wide range of competences under international law,” as “an effective mechanism for the prosecution of crimes against Ukraine” is needed.
“I urge all of us to make every possible effort to establish a Special Tribunal. It is our obligation towards the whole international community. Together we need to prove that international criminal law exists and works. And that justice prevails,” Duda said.
“Let’s make Russian criminals who represent violence, terror and death spend the rest of their lives behind bars,” he added.
Duda believes that the Russian aggression against Ukraine will end soon. “Russia will be stopped and defeated. It must be done both on the battlefield in combat and before a Special Tribunal to prosecute the crime of aggression against Ukraine,” he said.
“For more than one year Ukraine has been heroically fighting in the biggest war Europe has seen since World War Two. Ukraine is defending itself against the barbaric Russian aggressor that violates international law and all the principles and values our international community has agreed to follow,” Duda told the summit.
He enumerated four categories of violations of international criminal law: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression.
“As we all know, the last one seems to be the most problematic in terms of prosecution. But, frankly, it is the aggression that leads to other crimes,” Duda said.
He noted that the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued an arrest warrant for the Russian President Vladimir Putin in March.
“It sent a strong message to Russia but also to other states committing crimes that the enforcement of justice has already started,” Duda argued.
“It was indeed an important step forward, but we all have a moral duty to do much more. Especially due to the fact that the International Criminal Court cannot prosecute the crime of aggression in the Russian–Ukrainian case,” he continued.
Poland supported the initiative to establish a special tribunal to bring aggression against Ukraine into justice. The idea also gained the support of the European Parliament and the United States.