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On 25 February 2025, the Ukrainian International Strategy Center (UISC) held an online lecture titled "War Crimes Committed by Russia in Ukraine: Documentation, Evidence and International Accountability". The event attracted over 30 registered participants from countries including Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Austria, Slovakia, Germany, Poland, Japan, Australia and more. Attendees included human rights defenders, military personnel, journalists, diaspora representatives and activists.
The lecture was delivered by Iryna Musii, a human rights journalist and war crimes documentarian. She is the founder of the WOMEN UA community and has worked on high-profile documentation projects such as The Reckoning Project: Ukraine Testifies and an international research initiative on conflict-related sexual violence supported by the Partnership Fund for a Resilient Ukraine (PFRU) / Chemonics International.
Key Themes of the Lecture
• Definition of war crimes under international law: classification, legal documents, and the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC).
• The scale of Russian atrocities: over 150,000 documented cases, including mass torture, sexual violence, execution of prisoners of war, forced deportations of civilians and children.
• Testimonies of survivors: real-life accounts of public executions, torture chambers in Voronezh and Melitopol, and the use of sexual violence against women as a systematic tool of terror — including excerpts from Christina Lamb’s book "Our Bodies, Their Battlefield".
• Genocidal practices: forced deportations of children, erasure of Ukrainian identity, destruction of cultural heritage, and militarisation of education in occupied territories.
• International accountability efforts: arrest warrants against Russia’s top political and military leadership, the creation of a Special Tribunal, and the principle of universal jurisdiction — including legal cases filed abroad (e.g., in Argentina).
• How to speak to foreigners about war crimes: explaining Russia’s imperial ambitions, its history of impunity in past wars (e.g., Georgia, Syria, Chechnya), and the link between propaganda and violence.
The audience included representatives of civil society organisations such as Blue Bird, the Crimean Tatar community in the UK, the ReSew cooperative, as well as students, human rights defenders, military personnel, and psychological support professionals. Many attendees expressed interest in topics such as retraumatisation prevention, legal recognition of genocide, and strategies for raising awareness among international audiences.
After the lecture, attendees received access to the presentation, full video recording, and a curated collection of materials — including reports by the Lemkin Centre, Human Rights Watch, legal case studies, and investigations into Russia’s use of culture as a soft power tool.
The Ukrainian International Strategy Center (UISC) thanks the speaker and all participants for their engagement. We will continue this series of public lectures and invite everyone to join future events. Follow us for updates via our website and social media.
Contact us: uisc.eu | info@uisc.eu
English
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