The European Court of Human Rights ruled July 9 that Russia committed systematic violations of international law in Ukraine, including regarding the 2014 downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17.
In a 501-page judgment, the court, which is based in Strasbourg, France, found that Russia’s actions exceeded lawful military operations. It cited forced labor, torture, looting, transfer of children without legal or parental consent, persecution of religious minorities, “use of rape as a weapon of war,” and political indoctrination of Ukrainian schoolchildren.
“In none of the conflicts previously before [had] there been such near universal condemnation of the ‘flagrant’ disregard by the respondent State for the foundations of the international legal order established after the Second World War,” the court said.
It concluded that “the vast volume of evidence” revealed “interconnected practices of manifestly unlawful conduct by agents of the Russian State… on a massive scale across Ukraine.”
The court also held Russia liable for the July 17, 2014, downing of Flight MH17, which killed all 298 people on board, including 196 Dutch citizens. A Russian-made missile, fired from Russian-controlled territory in eastern Ukraine, struck the aircraft, according to the court’s press release.
In its unanimous ruling, the court said the missile was fired “either by a member of the Russian military crew of the Buk truck” or by Russian-backed separatists. It added that identifying the individual shooter was “not necessary” because the Russian state controlled both its military and the separatists at the time.
According to Politico, the move marks the first time an international court has formally found Russia guilty of human rights violations since its 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
When asked about the ruling, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed it as “null and void,” telling Russian media the government had “no intention to abide by it,” The New York Times reported.
Russia is no longer bound by court rulings after being expelled from the Council of Europe in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine.
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Author: Elise DeGeeter
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