Review

This article is devoted to an analysis of the status of victims of international crimes in international criminal law with particular reference to those victims who have been harmed in different regions of Ukraine (Kyiv, Crimea, Eastern Ukraine) since 21 November 2013. In other words, the author conducts a concise analysis of who can qualify as a victim of international crimes as well as of what set of rights such a victim possesses in proceedings before the International Criminal Court (ICC). These general remarks, in turn, are subsequently situated in the wider perspective of the so-called Ukrainian case.

It is argued that for a long time victims of international crimes have been forgotten subjects of international criminal trials. The situation has only changed gradually with the development of international criminal law since the Nuremberg trials until 1998 when the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) was adopted. Nowadays, victims’ procedural rights are expanding as, in fact, are definitions of victimhood provided for in various international legal documents (i.e. definition of victims of crime included in rule 85 of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence of the ICC). It follows that both natural persons and legal persons can qualify as victims of crime in proceedings before the International Criminal Court. Apart from that, also the concept of an international crime is subject to certain controversies which cannot be solved by a mere reference to legal definitions or texts. Therefore, it is argued that international crimes should be differentiated from ordinary offences due to their different normative source and the specific context of the commission of these crimes. Moreover, the author also criticizes non-legal (moral) justifications underlying the differentiation between international and ordinary crimes. In part IV, in turn, the current status of the ‘Ukrainian situation’ before the International Criminal Court is examined. The author concludes the substantive part with cataloguing the list of procedural rights that victims of international crimes have been equipped with together with the adoption of the ICC’s Rome Statute and which, potentially, can be acquired by victims of international crimes that have been committed during the Ukrainian crisis.

Keywords: victims, international crimes, International Criminal Court, Ukraine, justice.