The European Commissioner for Justice and Democracy Michael McGrath has issued Donald Trump a new red line which will anger the Kremlin and should make Vladimir Putin worried.
A few months back Trump met with Putin in Alaska with all the trimmings, a red carpet and fly past of US military aircraft to negotiate a peace agreement where the two leaders cosied up.
The US President said that the Russian dictator can re-join the G8 should peace be secured in Ukraine with lasting guarantees.
The European Commissioner warned Europe will not agree to any peace deal unless Putin is punished for a long list of war crimes since he launched the full-scale invasion in Ukraine.
McGrath told Politico, “I don’t think history will judge kindly any effort to wipe the slate clean for Russian crimes in Ukraine.
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“They must be held accountable for those crimes, and that will be the approach of the European Union in all of these discussions.
“Were we to do so, to allow for impunity for those crimes, we would be sowing the seeds of the next round of aggression and the next invasion.
“And I believe that that would be a historic mistake of huge proportions.”
McGrath added, “We cannot give up on the rights of the victims of Russian aggression and Russian crimes.”
Dr Alice Jill Edwards said that Russian war crimes and the measure of torture is “off the charts” and Putin is responsible.
Edwards who authored a UN report on Russian war crimes told The Telegraph, “At no time have I seen directives from the hierarchy for Russian soldiers and others to stop torturing. That’s what I’ve asked for. Those directives do not exist.
“It is the level of the state; it’s Putin himself and Lavrov who have responsibility for these types of policies.
“The Russian state itself will be held accountable. Torture remains part of, in my view, Russian war tactics and war policy.”
Earlier this year the US President sanctioned the International Criminal Court (ICC) in what was hailed by a Russian official as “a gift to Moscow.”
The ICC issued international arrests warrants for Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova on 17 March 2023, who oversaw the forced illegal deportations of Ukrainian children to Russia.
The Kremlin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, “Russia does not recognise the ICC. U.S. sanctions against them are none of our business.”
Despite this the ICC has come out said they will continue to hold Russian accountable for their war crimes which has and still is happening in Ukraine.
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi during a briefing, “I think that the US decisions are not related to the Ukrainian context, and we hope that they will not affect the court’s ability to achieve justice and justice for the victims of Russian aggression.”
The ICC also issued arrest warrants for Valery Gerasimov and the Sergei Shoigu for war crimes.
The war crimes committed by Shoigu and Gerasimov took place between 10 October 2022 until 9 March 2023 as they are responsible for missile attacks on civilian infrastructure and the energy sector which affected tens of thousands of Ukrainians during the freezing winter months.
