{"id":30346,"date":"2023-03-15T20:47:06","date_gmt":"2023-03-15T20:47:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/federaltimes\/uncategorized\/2023\/03\/15\/activists-pentagon-spar-over-sharing-evidence-of-russian-war-crimes\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T14:52:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T14:52:12","slug":"activists-pentagon-spar-over-sharing-evidence-of-russian-war-crimes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/federaltimes\/congress\/2023\/03\/15\/activists-pentagon-spar-over-sharing-evidence-of-russian-war-crimes\/","title":{"rendered":"Activists, Pentagon spar over sharing evidence of Russian war crimes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Department of Defense<\/a> is reportedly blocking the Biden administration from sending evidence of Russian war crimes in Ukraine to the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands, despite Congress passing looser restrictions for the U.S. government to help the international body in its prosecution of war crimes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Military leaders, including Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin<\/a>, are among those opposed to providing such evidence to the ICC, the international body in charge of prosecuting atrocities and genocide, according to a New York Times report<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pentagon officials reportedly fear it would create precedent for the court to charge United States citizens, which has stood as a redline for policymakers since the court\u2019s inception. Intelligence agencies, the State Department and Justice Department, meanwhile, have all shown support for evidence sharing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And while President Joe Biden has yet to come to a conclusion on the issue, atrocity prevention advocates are speaking out, arguing that the Pentagon belied its concerns over the impact of evidence sharing on the prosecution of U.S. citizens \u2014 or how the court even operates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the ICC was founded in 1998, the U.S. fought to prevent the prosecution of any citizens in countries that were not party to the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the international court. The U.S. government lost that debate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since then, any person, regardless of citizenship, who is charged with a war crime in a country that has signed onto the ICC can be investigated and prosecuted by the court, making Sec. Austin\u2019s concerns moot, advocates argue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just not how it works,\u201d Adam Keith, the director of accountability at Human Rights First, told Military Times. \u201cThe issue of whether the court has jurisdiction in situations [involving U.S. citizens] was settled 25 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Keith referenced a 2012 instance in which the court issued arrest warrants for Rwandan rebel leaders Sylvestre Mudacumura and Bosco Ntaganda for alleged war crimes committed in the Democratic Republic of Congo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the pair were citizens of Rwanda, a nation that does not recognize the ICC\u2019s jurisdiction, the court could still prosecute because their crimes were committed in the DRC, a country which is a signatory to the international treaty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In theory, an incident similar to the one involving Ntaganda and Mudacumura\u2019s could happen to a U.S. citizen who commits a war crime in a country that has signed onto the Rome Statute, Keith said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kenneth Roth, the former executive director of Human Rights Watch, also argued in a tweet that the Pentagon was \u201cflouting\u201d the rest of the U.S. government by continuing to block evidence sharing between the Pentagon and ICC.<\/p>\n\n\n