International Criminal Court chief prosecutor Karim Khan told CNN it may be challenging to guarantee that justice will be served after the war, given that Russia has withdrawn its signature from the ICC statute.
“We can’t be naive about things. We need to be realistic,” Khan said. “But first things first, collect the evidence, preserve it, analyze it, and make determinations based on what it shows. And those determinations can be checked by judges.”
Khan said he visited the Ukrainian towns of Bucha and Borodyanka this week, where mass graves of murdered civilians were discovered in early April following the Russian forces’ withdrawal from northern Ukraine.
“Ukraine is a crime scene,” Khan said, according to a tweet by the ICC. “We’re here because we have reasonable grounds to believe that crimes within the jurisdiction of the ICC are being committed. We have to pierce the fog of war to get to the truth.”
Khan said he believed the mission of investigating war crimes affects not just Ukraine but the entire world, and that “a common front needs to be built.”
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