Ukrainian justice minister: Russia ignores ECHR decisions on captured Ukrainian sailors

Ukrainian Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko said this, when asked by an Ukrinform correspondent what international legal consequences can arise from bringing criminal charges against the captured Ukrainian sailors and Ukrainian servicemen, whom the Russian Investigative Committee is trying to accuse of "commission of crimes against humanity."

“These clumsy actions of the Russian services and investigative agencies aim to cover up the obvious crimes they commit in the territory of the occupied Crimea and Donbas. The so-called “Putin's investigation” is an attempt to make a picture in their information space, which would depict Ukrainians committing some kind of crime against humanity. In fact, Russia commits this crime by capturing our territories and our citizens, killing Ukrainian citizens on the territory of Ukraine,” Petrenko noted.

He recalled that the law enforcement agencies of Ukraine maintain constant and close contact with the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, which receives detailed information about the violations and crimes committed by Russian-backed militants and Russian armed forces in the territory of Donbas and Crimea.

The Ukrainian side raises the issue of the release of Ukrainian sailors, who were captured during an armed provocation of the Russian military against the Ukrainian ships near the Kerch Strait last November, at almost every meeting with European partners, the minister stressed.

Currently, Ukrainian Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko pays a working visit to Brussels, leading a representative delegation of Ukrainian lawyers.

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