Instituto de Estudios Políticos y Derecho Público "Dr. Humberto J. La Roche"
de la Facultad de Ciencias Jurídicas y Políticas de la Universidad del Zulia
Maracaibo, Venezuela
Esta publicación cientíca en formato digital es continuidad de la revista impresa
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197402ZU34
ppi 201502ZU4645
Vol.40 N° 73
Julio
Diciembre
2022
Recibido el 14/03/2022 Aceptado el 06/06/2022
ISSN 0798- 1406 ~ De pó si to le gal pp 198502ZU132
Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas
La re vis ta Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas, es una pu bli ca ción aus pi cia da por el Ins ti tu to
de Es tu dios Po lí ti cos y De re cho Pú bli co “Dr. Hum ber to J. La Ro che” (IEPDP) de la Fa-
cul tad de Cien cias Ju rí di cas y Po lí ti cas de la Uni ver si dad del Zu lia.
En tre sus ob je ti vos fi gu ran: con tri buir con el pro gre so cien tí fi co de las Cien cias
Hu ma nas y So cia les, a tra vés de la di vul ga ción de los re sul ta dos lo gra dos por sus in ves-
ti ga do res; es ti mu lar la in ves ti ga ción en es tas áreas del sa ber; y pro pi ciar la pre sen ta-
ción, dis cu sión y con fron ta ción de las ideas y avan ces cien tí fi cos con com pro mi so so cial.
Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas apa re ce dos ve ces al año y pu bli ca tra ba jos ori gi na les con
avan ces o re sul ta dos de in ves ti ga ción en las áreas de Cien cia Po lí ti ca y De re cho Pú bli-
co, los cua les son so me ti dos a la con si de ra ción de ár bi tros ca li fi ca dos.
ESTA PU BLI CA CIÓN APA RE CE RE SE ÑA DA, EN TRE OTROS ÍN DI CES, EN
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nes Cien tí fi cas y Tec no ló gi cas Ve ne zo la nas del FO NA CIT, La tin dex.
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Eduviges Morales Villalobos
Fabiola Tavares Duarte
Ma ría Eu ge nia Soto Hernández
Nila Leal González
Carmen Pérez Baralt
Co mi té Ase sor
Pedro Bracho Grand
J. M. Del ga do Ocan do
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Ri car do Com bel las
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Re vis ta Cues tio nes Po lí ti cas. Av. Gua ji ra. Uni ver si dad del Zu lia. Nú cleo Hu ma nís ti co. Fa-
cul tad de Cien cias Ju rí di cas y Po lí ti cas. Ins ti tu to de Es tu dios Po lí ti cos y De re cho Pú bli co
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com ~ loi chi ri nos por til lo@gmail.com. Te le fax: 58- 0261- 4127018.
Vol. 40, Nº 73 (2022), 251-259
IEPDP-Facultad de Ciencias Jurídicas y Políticas - LUZ
Prevention of crimes performed
by the Russian federation against
humanity in Ukraine
DOI: https://doi.org/10.46398/cuestpol.4073.12
Vasil Felyk *
Vyacheslav Tylchyk **
Rostislav Lemekha ***
Iryna
Kurbatova ****
Andrii Hmyrin *****
Abstract
The purpose of the investigation is to improve criminal
legislation in accordance with international standards in the
context of the prevention of crimes against humanity in Ukraine.
The issue of combating crimes against humanity in the twenty-
rst century was addressed. The commission of such crimes
violates a number of international conventions and treaties, including
the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court of 17 July 1998, the
Charter of the United Nations of 26 June 1945, the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights of 10 December 1948, the Convention for the Protection
of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of 4 November 1950, etc.
The methodological basis of the research consists of general and special
scientic methods of scientic knowledge. The conclusions have established
that the invasion of the territory of Ukraine by the Russian Federation, the
use of weapons of mass destruction, missiles and machine guns against the
civilian population is a usurpation not only of the territorial integrity of
Ukraine, but also of the European values that have been built over centuries
in response to the experience of war.
Keywords: war crimes; crimes against humanity; international criminal
court; prevention of crimes; nancial sanctions.
* Professor, Rector of the Kyiv Institute of Intellectual Property and Law of the National University
"Odesa Law Academy", Doctor of Law, Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9326-4317
** Professor, Vice-Rector for Research of the Kyiv Institute of Intellectual Property and Law of the National
University "Odesa Law Academy" Doctor of Law, Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-
5964-3439
*** Professor of the Department of Medical Law, Danylo Halytskyi Lviv National Medical University,
Doctor of Law, Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9013-8318
**** Prosecutor of the Department of Kyiv City Prosecutor's Oce, Doctor of Law. Ukraine. ORCID ID:
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6636-2408
***** Associate Professor of the Department of Criminal Justice, Candidate of Juridical Science, State Tax
University, Ukraine. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9343-5684
252
Vasil Felyk, Vyacheslav Tylchyk, Rostislav Lemekha, Iryna Kurbatova y Andrii Hmyrin
Prevention of crimes performed by the Russian federation against humanity in Ukraine
Prevención de crímenes realizados por la federación
rusa contra la humanidad en Ucrania
Resumen
El propósito de la investigación es mejorar la legislación penal de
acuerdo con los estándares internacionales en el contexto de la prevención
de crímenes de lesa humanidad en Ucrania. Se abordó el tema del combate
a los crímenes de lesa humanidad en el siglo XXI. La comisión de tales
crímenes viola una serie de convenciones y tratados internacionales,
incluidos el Estatuto de Roma de la Corte Penal Internacional de 17 de
julio de 1998, la Carta de las Naciones Unidas de 26 de junio de 1945, la
Declaración Universal de Derechos Humanos de 10 de diciembre de 1948,
la Convenio para la Protección de los Derechos Humanos y las Libertades
Fundamentales de 4 de noviembre de 1950, etc. La base metodológica
de la investigación consiste en métodos cientícos generales y especiales
del conocimiento cientíco. En las conclusiones se ha establecido que la
invasión del territorio de Ucrania por parte de la Federación Rusa, el uso de
armas de destrucción masiva, misiles y ametralladoras contra la población
civil es una usurpación no solo de la integridad territorial de Ucrania, sino
además de los valores europeos que se han construido durante siglos en
respuesta a la experiencia de la guerra.
Palabras clave: crímenes de guerra; crímenes de lesa humanidad; corte
penal internacional; prevención de crímenes; sanciones
nancieras.
Introduction
Nobody could expect that the 21st century would give a place for such
terrible crimes against humanity known during the World War Two. But
Ukraine has faced such terrible crimes.
Despite the Minsk agreements, on February 24, 2022, the Russian
Federation has invaded the territory of Ukraine and opened hostilities
aimed at its occupation. According to the Oce of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights this resulted in great civilian casualties:
From 24 February, 2022, when Russia started the war against Ukraine, to
0:00 AM on 12 March, 2022 they amounted to 1,663 civilians, including
596 dead.
During a press conference with foreign journalists, the President of
Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky named the number of dead victims among
the Armed Forces of Ukraine for the rst time. According to him, during 17
days of the war about 1300 Ukrainian military men were killed, and Russian
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CUESTIONES POLÍTICAS
Vol. 40 Nº 73 (2022): 251-259
military casualties amounted to more than 12 thousand (Khan, 2022).
Irreparable damage to the Ukrainian economy, private property of citizens
and objects of cultural value has been caused. According to KSE data received
from volunteers as of 10 March, 2022, at least 200 educational institutions,
30 health care facilities, 8 churches, 1,600 residential buildings, 19 oce
buildings, 23 factories and their warehouses, 12 airports, 5 thermal power
plants and hydropower plants were damaged or completely destroyed. In
addition to that, more than 15,000 km of roads, 5,000 km of railways and
350 bridges were destroyed or disabled (Svyrydenko, 2022).
1. Literature review
Some aspects of this problem have already been studied by many
scientists and scholars.
M.I. Khavroniuk researched the issue concerning harmonization of
the criminal legislation of Ukraine with legislation of foreign countries
and requirements of international agreements (Khavroniuk, 2005). The
relevance of this topic has been also conrmed by existing thesis works
on this issue. G.V. Epur has studied the issue concerning implementation
of international legal acts in the criminal legislation of Ukraine (Epur,
2005). S.P. Kuchevska has studied problems concerning harmonization
of Ukrainian legislation on criminal liability with the Statute of the
International Criminal Court (Kuchevska, 2008).
At the same time, taking into account the events taking place in
Ukraine, it preserves its relevance. But this gives grounds to argue that it
is appropriate to conduct research on countering crimes against humanity
2. Materials and methods.
Application of the dogmatic method contributed to clarifying content
of international treaties that provide for liability for war crimes, content
of international treaties which provide for fundamental human rights.
The dialectical method has contributed to analysing the concept of war
crimes and crimes against humanity in international and national criminal
law. The comparative-legal method was used in international criminal
law standards for the purpose to use the world experience of establishing
responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Methods of
deduction, analysis and generalization were used within the framework of
the studying doctrinal provisions on the investigated issue. The system-
functional method gave an opportunity to analyze the available domestic
literature, which covers the issue of responsibility for war crimes and
concepts and characteristic features of implementation.
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Vasil Felyk, Vyacheslav Tylchyk, Rostislav Lemekha, Iryna Kurbatova y Andrii Hmyrin
Prevention of crimes performed by the Russian federation against humanity in Ukraine
3. Results and discussion
Among other things the Preamble to the Rome Statute states that in the
21st century, millions of children, women and men have fallen victims of
inconceivable crimes that have deeply shaken the conscience of mankind;
these most serious crimes threaten general peace, security and prosperity;
the most serious crimes causing concern for the entire international
community must not go unpunished and their eective prosecution
must be ensured both by measures taken at the national level and by the
intensication of international cooperation (Law of Ukraine, 1998).
This problem is a concern not just of a single country, but of all the
mankind. In this situation, after the aggression against Ukraine there is a
threat to the security of other countries of the world.
The level this problem has united the countries of the world is amazing.
Various countries help Ukraine as much as they can by means material
support, weapons, and an information attack about the RF. Poland has
accepted more than a million Ukrainians, supported families who agreed
to host them, Poland has oered to admit Ukraine to the EU. Moldova,
Romania and other countries also accept Ukrainians, EU countries agreed
to exclude the RF from the SWIFT system, imposed nancial sanctions on
the RF, arrested funds in banks; many brands refused to work in the RF.
However, as of March 17, 2022 NATO is still refusing to “close the
Ukrainian sky,” as well as to provide ghter planes, because it does not
want to enter into direct confrontation with the Russian Federation. And
active combat actions are going on in particular in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Mariupol,
Mykolayiv, Melitopol.
The Russian Federation is currently showing disrespect not merely to the
integrity of the territory of Ukraine, but to international values in general.
This state sets at nought agreements, ocial documents ratied by it, as
well as principles of international law. The parties agree on humanitarian
corridors, the time of silence for evacuation of people, the RF violates these
agreements as well. Russian soldiers kill civilian population, open re on
humanitarian aid vehicles, steal them, rape captured women, use heavy
weapons to destroy people’s homes, hospitals, nurseries and hostels. This is
terrible and this is a violation of international norms. And political leaders
of the Russian Federation distort information in their favor in terms of
defense against Ukraine. In particular during negotiations in Turkey the
Minister of Foreign Aairs of the Russian Federation Sergey Lavrov told
journalists that “Russia did not attack Ukraine.” Russia has introduced its
troops into Ukraine and kills peaceful population. And according to the RF
it is called “defense”.
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Vol. 40 Nº 73 (2022): 251-259
On 28 February, 2022, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal
Court (ICC) announced his decision to request permission to open an
investigation of the Situation in Ukraine on the basis of the preliminary
conclusions of the Oce resulting from its preliminary consideration and
covering any new alleged crimes under the ICC’s jurisdiction. The oce of
the ICC prosecutor received an appeal concerning the situation in Ukraine
from 39 states-participants of the ICC as required according to Article 14 of
the Statute. These appeals made it possible to launch an investigation of the
Situation in Ukraine since 21 November 2013, thus covering any previous
and current allegations of war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide
committed in any part of Ukraine by any person.
During the preliminary review of the situation in Ukraine the Oce
has already found reasonable grounds to believe that crimes within the
jurisdiction of the Court have been committed in Ukraine and the Oce
has identied potential cases admissible to be viewed by the Court. (Khan,
2022). On 07 March, 2022, public hearings of this case began in the
International Court of Justice (the Hague).
Any witness who can report any facts on killing of civilians performed
by the Russian occupiers, barbaric rocket bombings and artillery strikes
on hospitals, schools, houses and other civilian objects can do so by means
of direct sending information to the ICC Prosecutor by e-mail. A special
site https://www.ukrainetjdoc.org/ has also been created to document war
crimes.
On 16 March, 2022, the order of the International Court of Justice in
the dispute over interpretation of the Convention on the Prevention and
Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was announced. First, the Russian
Federation got a refusal as to closing the case, the case will be considered
on the merits; an armed attack cannot be conditioned and justied by
accusations of the victim of aggression in genocide; the Court did not nd any
evidence to support Russia’s allegations of genocide in Ukraine; the Court
orders the Russian Federation to take the following temporary measures:
immediately stop military operations, launched on 24 February, 2022 in
the territory of Ukraine; ensure that any military organisations or any other
organisations or persons under Russian control do not continue military
operations. The court unanimously orders the both parties to refrain from
actions that worsen the situation (International court of justice, 2022).
In accordance with Article 1 of the Charter of the United Nations dated
26 June 1945. The UN has the following goals: to maintain international
peace and security and, to that end, to take eective collective action to
prevent and eliminate threats to peace and suppress acts of aggression or
other violations of peace, and to carry out peaceful means in accordance
with the principles of justice and international law for settling or resolving
international disputes or situations, which may lead to violations of peace.
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Vasil Felyk, Vyacheslav Tylchyk, Rostislav Lemekha, Iryna Kurbatova y Andrii Hmyrin
Prevention of crimes performed by the Russian federation against humanity in Ukraine
Chapter 7 of the Statute establishes “actions concerning threats to peace,
breaches of peace and acts of aggression”.
In addition, for participants of armed hostilities in Ukraine it is also
important to strictly adhere to current norms of international humanitarian
law. And although it is dicult to talk about the justice and expediency of
war and bloodshed, it is the observance of preliminarily known rules and
agreements that puts the parties within relatively clear norms. Of course,
laws supposed to regulate something as radical as war will fall into the
same pitfalls as simpler laws. The Law on Armed Conicts is designed to
protect those who cannot defend themselves and to encourage nations and
combatants to ght within the framework of the Law on Armed Conicts
(Leheza et al., 2020).
No person has the right to commit crimes within the jurisdiction of
the International Criminal Court, including Ukraine (where these horric
events are taking place) and citizens of that country. Ukrainians often
show dissatisfaction with the humane attitude to prisoners, their feeding,
maintenance of hygienic norms, provision of necessary clothes and
medicines. But if Ukrainians treat them with cruelty, Ukraine will also be
violating international norms, in particular the Geneva Convention ratied
by Ukraine (Leheza et al., 2018).
According to Article 3 of the Geneva Convention on the Treatment
of Prisoners of War dated 12 August 1949 Persons who do not actively
participate in military activities, in particular those from the Armed Forces
who have ceased hostilities, as well as those who have stopped participating
in military activities in connection with illness, injury, detention or for any
other reason should be treated humanely in any circumstances, without
any discrimination on grounds of race, color of skin, religion or believes,
sex, origin or property status or any other similar criteria. To this end, it is
forbidden to continue such actions as (a) violence against life and person,
in particular all kinds of murder, mutilation, cruel treatment and torturing;
(b) seizure of hostages; (c) violation of human dignity, including abusive
and humiliating behavior; (d) conviction and application of punishment
without a preliminary court decision, which was duly established and which
provides judicial guarantees recognized by civilized Nations as necessary
(Law of Ukraine, 1990).
Section 20 (XX) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine provides criminal
liability for criminal oenses against peace, security of mankind and
international law. These oenses in particular include: War propaganda
(Article 436), planning, preparation, connection and conduct of aggressive
war (article 437), violation of laws and customs of war (Article 438), use of
weapons of mass destruction (Article 439), genocide (Article 442), ecocide
(Article 441), etc. The new Criminal Code of Ukraine (text as of18 January
2022), developed by a group of scientists since 2019, also provides for
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Vol. 40 Nº 73 (2022): 251-259
criminal responsibility for crimes against basics of international law and
international order (Book eleven). The book is structured into the following
sections: Section 11.1 (Genocide), Section 11.2 (Crimes against humanity),
Section 11.3 (Crime of aggression), Section 11.4 (Military crimes), and
Section 11.5 (Crimes against international law and order) (Law of Ukraine,
2001).
When noting the need to bring the national criminal laws into line
with the international criminal laws it is necessary to take into account
signicant dierences in approaches chosen by the international legal
system and the national legal system concerning denition of an act as
a criminal oense. In national law, the Criminal Code provides for legal
components of crime (corpus delicti), determines the type and severity of
punishment. The norms of international law establish the crime of certain
acts, mostly the composition of crimes, but generally do not contain clear
explanations regarding the types and extent of punishment. This is at the
discretion of the state (Tylchyk et al., 2022).
Conclusion
Despite the huge number of international instruments and institutions
aimed at ensuring peace, there are still wars in the world, encroachments
on the territory of other states, mass killing of people and destruction of
civilian buildings.
Violation of fundamental human rights and freedoms provided for in
international instruments has been dened as inadmissible. It has been
found that ratication of international instruments and the existence of
institutions aimed at ensuring peace in the modern civilized world should
prevent encroachments on the territory of other states, mass killing of
people and destruction of civilian buildings.
Every person is a value, human rights are a value. And no political
ambition is worth human life. Russian Federation’s invasion of the
territory of Ukraine, the use of mass destruction weapons, missiles and
machine-guns against the civilian population is an encroachment not only
upon the territorial integrity of Ukraine. It has been established that any
armed invasion of the territory of another state in the 21st centuries is an
encroachment not only upon territorial integrity. This is an encroachment
on European values. These values have been built for centuries in response
to the experience of war. Thus, other states are also at risk if an eective
mechanism of counteraction has not been developed.
The conclusion is drawn on the necessity of integration and unity in
preventing crimes against humanity and military crimes. Integration of
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Vasil Felyk, Vyacheslav Tylchyk, Rostislav Lemekha, Iryna Kurbatova y Andrii Hmyrin
Prevention of crimes performed by the Russian federation against humanity in Ukraine
the international community to ensure peace is particularly conditioned
by existence of global problems, environmental and economic crisis,
epidemics, epizootics, poverty and other problems; and it must be executed
as never before.
It is proposed to provide additional guarantees for implementation of
decisions made by international institutions against the aggressor state, to
improve the mechanism for imposing sanctions on a state that has violated
international agreements.
Determined is the necessity to observe standards of human rights
standards in criminal prosecution of persons who have committed crimes
against humanity and aver been involved in such crimes. The civilized world
must meet civilized standards and ensure security through civilized means.
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www.serbi.luz.edu.ve
www.produccioncienticaluz.org
Esta revista fue editada en formato digital y publicada
en julio de 2022, por el Fondo Editorial Serbiluz,
Universidad del Zulia. Maracaibo-Venezuela
Vol.40 Nº 73
