Posted on 05/31/2022 8:25:20 PM PDT by UMCRevMom@aol.com
Today, the European Union, the United States, and the United Kingdom announced the creation of the Atrocity Crimes Advisory Group (ACA), a mechanism aimed at ensuring efficient coordination of their respective support to accountability efforts on the ground. The ACA will reinforce current EU, U.S. and UK efforts to further accountability for atrocity crimes in the context of Russia’s ongoing war of aggression against Ukraine. It advances commitments made by the European Union, the United States, and the United Kingdom to demonstrate international support and solidarity at this crucial historical moment for Ukraine.
The overarching mission of the ACA is to support the War Crimes Units of the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine (OPG) in its investigation and prosecution of conflict-related crimes. The ACA seeks to streamline coordination and communication efforts to ensure best practices, avoid duplication of efforts, and encourage the expeditious deployment of financial resources and skilled personnel to respond to the needs of the OPG as the legally constituted authority in Ukraine responsible for dealing with the prosecution of war crimes on its own territory.
EU High Representative/Vice-President Josep Borrell said: “It is critical to ensure that all those responsible for the terrible atrocities committed during the unprovoked Russian military aggression in Ukraine are brought to justice. There can be no impunity for war crimes. The Atrocity Crimes Advisory Group will be providing advice and supporting the ongoing efforts of Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s War Crimes Units to collect, preserve, and analyze evidence of atrocities to help the investigations and ensure justice takes its course.”
US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said: “This initiative will directly support efforts by the Ukrainian Office of the Prosecutor General to document, preserve, and analyze evidence of war crimes and other atrocities committed by members of Russia’s forces in Ukraine, with a view toward criminal prosecutions. The ACA is an essential element of the United States’ commitment that those responsible for such crimes will be held to account.”
UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said: “We are determined to ensure those responsible for the vile atrocities committed in Ukraine are held to account. The UK has already made a clear commitment to supporting Ukraine in its investigations, including through deploying war crimes experts to the region and releasing additional funding to aid the ICC
in their investigations. We are now stepping up our efforts through this landmark initiative with our partners in the US and EU. Justice will be done.”
General Prosecutor of Ukraine, Iryna Venediktova said: “There is ample evidence of the atrocities committed by Russia’s forces on the territory of Ukraine against civilians, including children. The creation of this support group and the advice of international experts with experience in other international criminal tribunals and national criminal law practice will help the ongoing work of our teams in investigating and prosecuting these crimes.”
Operational support
The ACA will bring together multinational experts to provide strategic advice and operational assistance to OPG specialists and other stakeholders in areas such as collection and preservation of evidence, operational analysis, investigation of conflict-related sexual violence, crime scene and forensic investigations, drafting of indictments, and co-operation with international and national accountability mechanisms. This engagement with the OPG and other justice, law enforcement and security agencies of Ukraine has been and will continue to be driven by the needs of the Ukrainian government and the parameters of its support will be developed in close consultation with the OPG. To this end, it will closely associate its activities with the ongoing operational work taking place in cooperation with EU Member States, partner third countries and the International Criminal Court, including the Joint Investigation Team coordinated by Eurojust.
The ACA brings together a multi-national group of war crimes experts from European Union countries, the United States, the United Kingdom and other countries. Due to the current security situation in Ukraine, the experts are primarily based in south-eastern Poland but are operationally engaged in Ukraine, including by means of short-term missions and on-site interaction with the OPG staff and other international partners engaged. As the security situation permits, it is anticipated that experts and support staff will relocate entirely to Ukraine.
The ACA activity will cover coordination of two key elements:
Advisory Group to the OPG: Experienced senior war crimes prosecutors, investigators, military analysts, forensic specialists, and other experts based in the region on an ongoing basis provide expertise, mentoring, advice and operational support to the OPG and to the field-level Mobile Justice Teams, as well as a wider range of state and non-state actors. Mobile Justice Teams: Several Mobile Justice Teams (MJTs) are being created and deployed to increase the capacity of the OPG War Crimes Unit and regional prosecutors to conduct field investigations. The MJTs will be composed of both international and Ukrainian experts and will be deployed at the request of the OPG to assist Ukraine’s investigators on the ground. They will be part of the holisticchain for documentation, investigation and prosecution of grave international crimes that is led by the OPG.
The ACA is supported by the U.S. State Department’s Office of Global Criminal Justice (GCJ) and Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL). ACA partners include the Arizona State University Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, Global Rights Compliance, and the International Development Law Organization (IDLO). On the EU side, coordination will be ensured by the European External Action Service (EEAS), through the EU Delegation to Ukraine, in coordination with the European Commission, the EU Project Pravo-Justice II and the EU Advisory Mission Ukraine (EUAM). The UK contribution will be coordinated by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and other relevant UK Government Departments.
Background
The ACA is an operational hub that coordinates assistance in response to the technical and legal needs of the Government of Ukraine to hold perpetrators of international crimes to account. It constitutes one essential component of a broader multilateral effort to support Ukraine.
Like the genocidal Eurotrash have a leg to stand on to judge atrocities. The useless leeches should be hung for the crimes of their fathers.
Yeah, I said it.
I think the proper term is "realist". The American establishment is as crooked as a dog's hind leg.
I'm afraid that we will have to fumigate the establishment before things get better.
Powerless bullshit!
Logic dictates that if Russia correctly argues was wrong for America and the West to do that in Serbia, it must be wrong for Russia to now be doing the same thing in Ukraine.
Their state tv this week concluded on air that 5% - or 2 million - Ukrainians may need to be permanently relocated or culled to ensure the compliance of the rest. That’s talking about a Final Solution.
I don’t recall the USA going quite that far in the former Yugoslavia, let alone discussing it openly on national television.
This from the same bunch that gave us CoupFlu.
I’ll wait for the next scam, thank you.
Why?
Generally, it falls under the category of kicking a man while he is down. The west has been presented an opportunity for the elimination of a Russian threat for decades. Russian war crimes will translate into reparations to Ukraine that might include payment in Russian gas
So, drag out the lawyers to prepare the legal cases that will solidify sanctions and bite hard with reparations
More virtue posturing by the Weak Sisters Of The West.
The United States declined seeking a seat on the UNHRC during the Bush 43 Administration, to the point of boycotting it; this was reversed by the Obama Administration.
In 2018, during the Trump administration, the US outright quit because the UNHRC's stated mission is contradicted by the members elected to sit on it.
Why should we utilize the moral authority of the UNHRC in one instance (when it supports America's geopolitical aims) while spiting it in another (when doing so was also in America's interest)?
That just betrays the reality that the UNHRC is no moral authority at all, and that their condemnations and actions are essentially toothless.
A new “War Crimes” tribunal, run by Ukraine?!?
Gee, I wonder what they’ll find.
I’m ashamed of the US Government. They are completely responsible for this clownf*ck over there. Bit I’d be satisfied (for now) if we stopped all support for Ukraine.
I don’t give a rat’s behind about either country. Ukraine is a corruptocracy doing the dirty work for the US State Department, and laundering billions back to the US. It’s a shiitehole country. Congress shot down an accountability amendment for the last bolus of weapons. They’re in on it. Kickback city. Board seats, family employment, cush jobs when they leave, campaign cash out the wazoo.
And Ukraine is now selling the latest US weapans and military hardware out the backdoor to anyone with the cash. Our enemies will be using them against us in short order. Like the taliban in A$$crakistan and their billions left behind by our idiot leaders.
Russia ain’t a whole lot better, but completely rational in what they’ve done.
Russia is NOT our enemy. China and Iran are.
NATO is the Military Industrial Complex run wild, bankrupting us. We should pull out completely, let them play army man games on maps without us.
We have no direct national security threat to us over there. We have no business doing anything there, nor most of Europe. Let Europe figure out their own problems, and spend their own money doing it.
Pull out of NATO, and return ALL of our troops home. Shut down the bases.
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