Ukraine should take responsibility for any legal action against Russia because the West could “corrupt the process” for “cheap gas and oil”, a former international criminal prosecutor has told The Telegraph.
Professor Sir Geoffrey Nice KC was the lead prosecutor against Slobodan Milošević, a former president of Serbia, at the UN’s The Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) between 1998 and 2006.
He has been visiting Kyiv in recent months to discuss with the Ukrainian government how perpetrators of potential war crimes might be held to account.
Speaking to The Telegraph, he warned that “there are real risks of it subcontracting out” any legal action to the international community, saying it may end up with Crimea and the Donbas being sacrificed for a peace deal in exchange “for cheap oil and gas” for the West.
“The risks are that the internationals will have interests of their own to serve, that may allow them to affect or even to corrupt the process and you’ve always got to be alive to that,” he said.
He added that foreign powers could pressure Ukraine into accepting “a negotiated settlement” that could compromise the Donbas and Crimea.
“There might easily be pressure to trade off justice against a negotiated settlement,” he said. Asked what for, he responded: “For cheap gas and oil.”
Russia has repeatedly weaponised its vast supply of fossil fuels and threatened to restrict its supply to the West.
He also said an international legal process was likely to take much longer and to be more expensive.
Karim Ahmad Khan KC, the British barrister who serves as International Criminal Court’s (ICC) chief prosecutor, launched an investigation into alleged war crimes in Ukraine in March. However, there has been no meaningful update since then.
Professor Sir Geoffrey said that it would better serve Ukraine’s interests if it were to hold Russia to account themselves, as opposed to allowing the ICC to take over, because “all countries ultimately serve their own interests”.
“There’s a risk that a bad actor will seek to achieve and may succeed in achieving a narrow measure of moral equivalence,” he said.
Much of Sir Geoffrey’s work since his prosecution of Milošević has been connected to cases before the ICC – concerning Sudan, Kenya and Libya – or pro bono for victims groups – in Iran, Burma and North Korea – whose cases cannot get to an international court.
He is also chair of the China Tribunal and the Uyghur Tribunal, which have investigated human rights abuses in China.
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