Top international court issues arrest warrants for senior Russian officials over alleged war crimes

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants for two senior Russian officials, accusing them of overseeing war crimes against civilians during Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

Former Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu, a close ally of Vladimir Putin, and military chief Valery Gerasimov have been accused of “directing attacks at civilian objects”, “causing excessive incidental harm to civilians or damage to civilian objects” and perpetrating the crime against humanity of inhumane acts”.

The statement from the ICC added that there are “reasonable grounds to believe that the two suspects bear responsibility for missile strikes carried out by the Russian armed forces against the Ukrainian electric infrastructure from at least 10 October 2022 until at least 9 March 2023”.

They added that they believe that where strike targets may have qualified as military objectives at the time, the “expected incidental civilian harm and damage would have been clearly excessive to the anticipated military advantage”.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky’s top advisor, Andriy Yermak, labelled the move by the ICC as an “important decision”, adding that it was clear Shoigu and Gerasimov “bear individual responsibility”.

“Everyone will be [held] responsible for evil,” he wrote on the Telegram messenger app.

The country’s human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said the ICC decision meant Ukraine was a step closer to getting justice.

“Sooner or later, a just punishment will overtake every war criminal!” he said in a statement posted on his Telegram.

At least six Russian officials have now been handed arrest warrants since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

In March last year, arrest warrants were issued for Putin and his children’s commission Maria Lvova-Belova for their role in the alleged forcible deportation of Ukrainian children.

In March 2024, the ICC issued arrest warrants for top Russian commanders Sergei Kobylash and Viktor Sokolov for suspected war crimes in Ukraine, again related to “missile strikes carried out by the forces under their command against the Ukrainian electric infrastructure from at least 10 October 2022 until at least 9 March 2023”

The latest round of arrest warrants deals a blow to some of Russia’s most senior officials, both of whom have been heavily involved in Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia has denied committing war crimes in Ukraine and has accused the ICC of unfairly targeting Russian officials.

Shoigu served as Putin’s defence minister from 2012 until earlier this year, before he was appointed the head of the Russian Security Council, a top role in the Kremlin handling the country’s domestic and international security.

He was an instrumental figure in overseeing Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Last year, he visited North Korea ahead of Putin’s meeting with the nation’s dictator Kim Jong-un, in what experts said paved the way for an eventual military deal that saw Moscow receive lethal weapons from Pyongyang that they allegedly later used against Ukraine.

Gerasimov, who was appointed last year as the operational commander of the “special military operation” in Ukraine, a propagandistic phrase the Kremlin uses to describe its invasion of its neighbour, has directly overseen the war since its beginning. He is both the chief of the general staff and the deputy defence minister.

Russia has stepped up its long-range assault on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure in recent months, launching its eighth attack in the past three months just last week.

Moscow launched dozens of drones and missiles during the latest attack, injuring multiple civilian workers and causing yet more blackouts across the country. The Kremlin maintains that it does not target civilians.

President Zelensky recently said Moscow had destroyed half of his country’s electricity-generating capacity since it began pummelling its energy facilities in late March.

ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan visited Ukraine in March last year to investigate Russia’s campaign of missile and drone attacks on power plants and other infrastructure that killed hundreds of civilians and left millions with no electricity or water.

The Geneva conventions and additional protocols shaped by international courts say that parties involved in a military conflict must distinguish between “civilian objects and military objectives” and that attacks on civilian objects are forbidden.