Germany has collected “hundreds” of evidence of war crimes in Ukraine, Attorney General Peter Frank said in an interview published on Sunday calling for an international mechanism to bring those responsible to justice.
“At the moment, we are concentrating on Boutcha and the attacks on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine,” said Peter Frank, interviewed by the newspaper. Welt am Sonntag.
He added that most of the evidence came from interviews with Ukrainian refugees. The goal is “to prepare for a possible trial in the future, either in Germany or with one of our international partners or through an international court,” she explained.
Peter Frank clarified that his services began to investigate the situation in Ukraine in March 2022.
“We are not investigating specific individuals, rather we are gathering information and evidence,” he said.
However, he acknowledges that in order to prosecute war crimes suspects in Germany, they would have to be in that country.
A special court?
In January, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said she was in favor of creating a special court to try Russian leaders after the invasion of Ukraine, possibly using Ukrainian law. This court should be based abroad with international judges, according to her.
“Who do we want to bring to justice? The leaders, those who made the decision to go to war, and those who at the highest level of the army implement this decision,” said Peter Frank.
Hundreds of bodies were discovered in the kyiv suburb of Bucha after the Russian army was driven out in March 2022. The massacre sparked a wave of convictions and war crimes charges, which Moscow consistently denied.
The prosecution relied on the principle of universal jurisdiction, which allows prosecution of the most serious crimes regardless of where they were committed, to try Syrians for acts committed during the civil war.
Based on the same principle, a group of people from Burma filed a lawsuit last month in Germany against the military junta, accusing it of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Source: BFM TV
