ICJ Allows Ukraine's Case Against Russia

The United Nations' top court said a case brought by Ukraine against Russia over the brutal 2022 invasion could go ahead after ruling it had jurisdiction over most of the points made by Kyiv.

Ukraine dragged Russia before the International Court of Justice only a few days after the invasion, seeking to battle its neighbor on all fronts, legal as well as diplomatic and military.

When Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion on February 24, 2022, part of his argument was that pro-Russian people in eastern Ukraine had been "subjected to bullying and genocide by the Kyiv regime".

Ukraine filed a suit at the ICJ, "emphatically denying" this and arguing that Russia's use of "genocide" as a pretext for invasion went against the 1948 UN Genocide Convention.

In a preliminary ruling in March 2022, the ICJ sided with Ukraine and ordered Russia to halt its invasion immediately.

But Russia objected to this judgment, saying the ICJ, which decides on disputes between states, had no legal right to decide in this case.

The ICJ tossed out Moscow's argument, saying it did indeed have jurisdiction to rule on Ukraine's argument that "there is no credible evidence that Ukraine is responsible for committing genocide," over which Russia justified its invasion.

However, Ukraine had also claimed in its submission that Russia's use of force during the invasion was itself in contravention of the Genocide Convention.

The ICJ said it did not have competence to decide on this part of the case.

Ukraine's lead lawyer Anton Korynevych said "It is important that the court will decide on the issue that Ukraine is not responsible for some mythical genocide that the Russian Federation falsely alleged Ukraine has been committing since 2014 in Donbas."

The ICJ's rulings are binding and cannot be appealed but it has no means to enforce its decisions.