The Russian delegation has been insisting since the beginning of the Ukrainian lawsuit against it that Ukraine should have sent a note to Russia first, and then go to court. However, Ukraineʼs agent at the UN International Court of Justice Anton Korynevych explained that there is no direct such requirement in the Convention.
"We open the Genocide Convention, in particular Article 9, which deals with dispute resolution under this Convention. It says that all disputes are resolved by the UN International Court of Justice. There are no preliminary requirements, as, for example, in similar articles in other international treaties, where it is stated that one must first try to conduct negotiations and make arbitration, and if this does not succeed within a certain period, one can go to the International Court of the United Nations. There is no such thing in the Convention on Genocide," Ambassador with Special Assignments Anton Korynevych emphasized in an interview with "Babel".
According to him, this is a very broad article, which essentially gives the UN International Court of Justice exclusive competence to resolve disputes under this Convention. Therefore, Ukraine did not have to take any preliminary steps.
"The second point: by using claims of genocide, they should have understood that such claims could have legal consequences. Especially when they say that genocide became the basis for a full-scale invasion. And thirdly, we all understand the situation and circumstances of February 26 — they were near Kyiv. Therefore, I hope and believe that the court will not take into account these statements," the ambassador added.
- On September 27, 2023, two-week hearings at the UN International Court of Justice regarding the lawsuit against Russia, which Ukraine filed on February 26, 2022, ended in The Hague. In the lawsuit, Ukraine insists that Russia is manipulating the Convention on the Prevention of Genocide to justify its aggression. The hearing was a preliminary step — the court must decide whether it can hear the lawsuit at all. We have already written about the first round of hearings. The second one was opened by the Russians on September 25. They spent the whole day trying to repel the arguments of Ukraine and 32 countries that are asking the court to interpret the provisions of the Convention. The Russian delegation again devoted a large part of its speech to political statements: it denied the crimes of its army in Bucha, proved that the deportation of children is not a crime, but a forced evacuation, distorted the speeches of the members of the Ukrainian team. September 27 was the last day of the hearings — the Ukrainian delegation answered the Russian arguments. After that, the court went to make a decision, when it will be — it is not yet known.