The International Court of Justice, based in The Hague, found Russia guilty of some violations of the UN anti-terrorism treaty in eastern Ukraine. The Court ordered Russia to investigate plausible allegations of terrorist financing, but failed to order the payment of compensation as requested by Ukraine. Sky News reports it. The case before the United Nations’ highest court centers on Ukraine’s allegations that Russia financed separatist rebels in the country’s east in 2014, including those responsible for the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH-17 on 17 July 2014. According to Kiev, Russia has violated its obligations under the two UN treaties signed by both countries and has asked to be compensated for this. The case, filed in 2017, also accuses Russia of violating anti-discrimination conventions in its treatment of Crimea’s multi-ethnic community.
from the annexation of the peninsula to the Federation. During hearings last year, a Ukrainian lawyer, David Zionts, said that pro-Russian forces in eastern Ukraine “attacked civilians as part of a campaign of intimidation and terror. Russian money and weapons fueled this countryside”. Russia “tried to replace the multi-ethnic community that had characterized Crimea before the Russian intervention with a discriminatory Russian nationalism”, said another Ukrainian lawyer, Harold Koh, referring to the persecution of the Tatar community, with a Muslim majority. Russia’s lawyers have rejected the charges and urged the International Court to dismiss the case, arguing that the actions of pro-Moscow rebels in eastern Ukraine do not constitute terrorism. The rulings of the Court of The Hague are final and without appeal, but there is no mechanism that can enforce compliance with them.