The number of statements of support and written appeals to the UN International Court of Justice in the “Ukraine v. Russia” genocide case is unprecedented.
This was emphasized by the director of the Department of International Law of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Oksana Zolotaryova, in a comment to Ukrinform
She reminded that the first statement of more than 40 countries and the EU to publicly support the “Ukraine vs. Russia” genocide case was at the end of May. And on July 13, 42 countries and the EU announced their intention to join the case “Ukraine against the Russian Federation” regarding the application of the Convention on Genocide.
“Lithuania, Latvia, New Zealand and Great Britain have already officially submitted their memoranda. They are all on the court’s website and you can read them. The other day, the European Commission made a similar appeal, but considering the fact that the European Union is not a party, a state party to the Genocide Convention, they used another article and gave their position mostly on the facts of what happened in Ukraine from 2014 to 2022, how Ukraine rebuilt, in particular, its regions in the East with the help of the EU. That is, we can already say that such a number of statements of support and such a number of already written appeals to the UN International Court of Justice are unprecedented, and most likely, at some point the case “Ukraine against Russia” will turn into “World against the Russian Federation”, Zolotaryova said.
She noted that currently the memorandum of Ukraine is confidential, but the memorandums of other states are open.
“They mostly relate to the interpretation of the Convention on the Prevention of the Crime of Genocide. They say that, first of all, the court has the right to consider the case of Ukraine, it has jurisdiction, and that the Russian Federation distorts the provisions of this Convention by referring to it. Further, the states that have already submitted their statements and memoranda say that “we reserve the right to supplement these statements in the future,” the head of the department informed.
According to her, it is very difficult to predict when the next court session may take place, because it will depend on the further course of the case.
“Russia, according to the statute of the Court, has three months from the moment Ukraine submitted the memorandum, namely from July 1, to challenge the jurisdiction, to express so-called preliminary objections. If they do this, the Court will proceed to a written exchange of views between the parties specifically regarding issue of jurisdiction, followed by an oral hearing. And if the Russian Federation does not use this right, it has a deadline for submitting its counter-memorandum on March 23 next year, and then the issue of jurisdiction and the issue of substance will be considered by the Court at the same time,” Zolotaryova explained.
