The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants Tuesday for two Russian commanders it accused of targeting Ukraine’s power grid, ramping up an investigation into war crimes during Moscow’s invasion that earlier produced charges against President Vladimir Putin.
The ICC charged Lt. Gen. Sergei Ivanovich Kobylash, head of a long-range air force bombing unit at the time of the attacks, and Adm. Viktor Nikolayevich Sokolov, who was commander of the Black Sea Fleet, with directing missiles against Ukrainian power plants and distribution stations.
The campaign to knock out Ukraine’s power grid at issue began on Oct. 10, 2022, with a missile barrage targeting cities across the country. The missiles struck a host of civilian sites, including two public parks in Kyiv, killing more than a dozen people in the capital alone.
Such acts would violate the humanitarian-law prohibition on targeting civilian facilities.
Based in The Hague, the ICC is an independent tribunal established by treaty in 2002 to hold military and civilian leaders accountable for breaches of humanitarian law when a nation’s own legal system can’t or won’t do so.
Violations of the ICC’s founding treaty, the Rome Statute, can carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. The statute has no death penalty.
There is little chance that Moscow will consider the warrants valid or that the suspects will surrender, but Zelensky held out hope. “International justice requires time, but it is unavoidable,” he said.
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