Special Tribunal to be officially launched in Luxembourg next week - Luxembourg FM
A special tribunal for the crime of aggression committed by Russia against Ukraine will be launched in Luxembourg next week, Luxembourg Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel said.
"The tribunal will be launched next week in Luxembourg, where a meeting of the Council of Ministers of the Council of Europe will take place, where the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine will put forward official demands," he said during a conversation with journalists in Lviv.
In response to a question from journalists about how the United States' retreat from supporting the tribunal could be explained, the minister noted that the tribunal is an initiative of the Council of Europe. However, the United States is not a member of this organization and Bettel believes that this would be "geographically more difficult."
"I hope that this will be decided in Luxembourg next week, where we will have a meeting of ministers with the president, and Andriy Sybiha has been invited to be there. There will also be an official presentation of the documents for the creation of this tribunal," Bettel added.
When asked by journalists whether this would in any way affect the peace talks, the minister noted that Putin is not listening to anyone now.
"And even if he is caught, he continues to receive congratulations in some countries that are members of international organizations that we support. They do not implement what they signed, but whether this will exert pressure is still a question. It is important that there are more forces on the Ukrainian side, and this will help Ukraine. Together we will continue to work on this initiative, and I hope that progress will be made in Luxembourg next week," he noted.
As sources told the Interfax-Ukraine agency, the future special tribunal will be able to investigate cases against the so-called "troika" - Putin-Lavrov-Mishustin - up to the stage of the prosecutor issuing an indictment. That is, the tribunal prosecutor will formulate the charges, make a public statement that the "troika" is guilty of committing a crime of aggression, the indictment will be sent to the pretrial judge and the process will be suspended - while the "troika" are in their positions. And as soon as they leave their positions, the trial will automatically resume. If these people do not physically appear in the dock, the trial will be in absentia.
Lukashenko and Kim Jong Un will also be in the tribunal's sights, but not the Iranian authorities. There is no legal component of the crime of aggression on the part of Iran as such, because aggression is not about the supply of drones and missiles.
The "twenty" highest military-political leaders of the Russian Federation - Medvedev, Shoigu, Naryshkin, Gerasimov, Bortnikov, Zolotov, etc. - will not have any immunities: both the investigation and sentencing for them will be entirely possible.