US administration suspends investigation into Putin’s war crimes – NYT

The US Department of Justice has discreetly notified European officials of its decision to withdraw from the International Center for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine (ICPA). The center was established to investigate those responsible for the invasion of Ukraine, including Vladimir Putin.

The New York Times writes about this, citing sources.

The decision to withdraw from the International Center for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine, which the Joseph Biden administration joined in 2023, is the latest evidence of the Trump administration's departure from Biden's commitment to hold Putin personally accountable for crimes committed against Ukrainians.

The group was created to hold the Russian leadership, as well as its allies in Belarus, North Korea and Iran, accountable for a category of crimes that is defined under international law and treaties as aggression that violates the sovereignty of another country and does not constitute self-defense.

According to sources familiar with the situation, the decision is expected to be announced on March 17 in an email to staff and members of the group's parent organization, the European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation, better known as Eurojust.

The United States has been the only country outside Europe to cooperate with the group, sending a senior Justice Department prosecutor to The Hague to work with investigators from Ukraine, the Baltic states and Romania.

The Trump administration is also scaling back the work of the War Crimes Accountability Group, which was created in 2022 by then-Attorney General Merrick Garland and staffed with experienced prosecutors. It was designed to coordinate the Justice Department's efforts to hold Russians responsible for atrocities committed after the full-scale invasion three years ago.

"There is no place for war criminals to hide," Garland said in announcing the unit's creation.

He added that the department "will use every opportunity to hold accountable those who commit war crimes and other atrocities in Ukraine."

For reference:

During the Biden administration, the group known as WarCAT played a crucial supportive role by:

• providing logistical support, 
• training, 
• and direct assistance to Ukrainian prosecutors and law enforcement in prosecuting Russian war crimes in Ukrainian courts. 

The team achieved a significant milestone in December 2023, when US prosecutors, for the first time since the war crimes law was enacted nearly three decades ago, charged four Russian soldiers in absentia with torturing an American resident in Ukraine's Kherson region.

President Trump has grown closer to Putin, clashing with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, going so far as to falsely suggest that Ukraine played a role in provoking Russia's brutal and illegal military invasion.

"You shouldn't have started this," Trump said in February, referring to Ukraine's leaders. "You could have made a deal."

He called Zelensky "a dictator without an election" and said he had "done a terrible job" in office.

The sources said the Trump administration did not give any reason for withdrawing from the investigative team other than the same explanation as for other personnel and policy moves: the need to reallocate resources.

On the eve, the Pre-Trial Chamber II of the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov, who are responsible for missile strikes carried out by the Russian armed forces on Ukrainian power infrastructure from at least October 10, 2022 to at least March 9, 2023.

As Rubryka previously reported, on March 5, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for the commander of the Russian Long-Range Aviation Sergey Kobylash and the commander of the Russian Black Sea Fleet Viktor Sokolov. As noted, the corresponding decision was approved as part of the investigation into potential war crimes by Russian occupiers on the territory of Ukraine committed in the period from October 10, 2022 to March 9, 2023.

In addition, on March 17, 2023, the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin, the President of the Russian Federation. The order was also issued in the name of Maria Lvova-Belova, the commissioner for the rights of the child under the president of Russia.