Nobel Peace Prize Laureate OLEKSANDRA MATVIICHUK — On Crime and Retribution, Civilization and Barbarism
Oleksandra Matviichuk — Ukrainian human rights defender and head of the Center for Civil Liberties»
Last year, she received the Nobel Peace Prize, and in 2016 she became a laureate of the Democracy Defender Award, presented by the OSCE. The BBC and the Financial Times included her in their lists of the world’s most influential women. Today, Oleksandra Matviichuk, a Ukrainian human rights defender and head of the Center for Civil Liberties, is a guest of our editorial team. We will talk about how war changes our consciousness, Ukrainians’ right to justice, crime and retribution, civilization and barbarism.
THE WAR FORCED THE WORLD TO LISTEN TO HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS!
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efore the war, the protection of human rights and human dignity was discussed almost exclusively at specialized forums. We were heard mainly at the UN Human Rights Committee or, for example, at the OSCE’s annual Human Dimension meetings. But in the places where important political decisions are made, the voices of human rights defenders were not heard loudly enough.
A great deal changed after Russia invaded Ukraine in February last year. For the first time, we felt that people wanted to listen to us and that we were being heard. This is because human rights defenders help make sense of what is happening from the perspective of universal human values, to understand how crimes on such a scale became possible in the twenty-first century and what should be done about them next.
That is why I see my inclusion in “lists of influential people” in a broader context — as a consequence of humanity’s search for answers to difficult questions.
RUSSIA IS NOT JUST AN AGGRESSOR STATE…
In the twenty-first century, we must honestly answer the question: do international conventions and organizations matter to us, or will we recognize only brute force? The invasion of Ukraine is being carried out by more than just an aggressor state.
It is being carried out by a member of the UN Security Council with nuclear capabilities. A country that is supposed to be a guarantor of the global security system is challenging the values that civilization has developed over thousands of years.
International law and the security system established after World War II no longer work. Today, no one can use the law to stop the atrocities of Putin’s regime. Relying on military assistance to our country and economic sanctions against Russia is a necessary measure!
In the future, we must rebuild the international security system to protect people from authoritarian regimes, regardless of whether they possess nuclear weapons or not.
OVERCOMING THE CRISIS OF VALUES
Behind the crisis of the international security system lies a crisis of values. And not only because rights and freedoms in authoritarian countries have been reduced to the size of a prison cell. Even in countries with well-established democracies, political forces have emerged that regard human rights as something secondary, subordinate to political and economic expediency.
In the short term, this “pragmatism” produced certain results. But the war unleashed by Russia has shown that in the long run, you lose if you make decisions that ignore fundamental values. The war has become an existential experience that has transformed the consciousness of Ukrainians.
“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights” — this provision of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is no longer perceived as something abstract.
КFortunately, the leaders of many countries around the world have not experienced trauma comparable to that endured by Ukrainians. But this makes it difficult for them to fully grasp both the lessons of the current war and the experience of the global upheavals and catastrophes of the previous century.
THE CLASH BETWEEN CIVILIZATION AND BARBARISM
Nine years ago, my colleagues and I began documenting war crimes. But after the full-scale Russian invasion, we encountered unimaginable atrocities and found ourselves immersed in an ocean of human suffering. It is difficult to comprehend all of this! After all, you do not need to be a lawyer to understand that civilians must not be killed, women must not be raped, and people must not be unlawfully detained and tortured… To think and act otherwise is to negate the entire history of human civilization.
Today, what is taking place in Ukraine is not merely a clash between authoritarianism and democracy. By justifying its right to kill, commit acts of violence and torture, Russia has revived a deeper conflict of values — between civilization and barbarism. Barbarians always act from a position of brute force. Civilization, on the other hand, is a more complex structure, with various instruments of influence at its disposal, including legal ones.
MURDER MUST BE CALLED MURDER
We document evidence of war crimes and then submit it to international institutions that investigate these crimes or provide legal assessments of them: the International Criminal Court and international organizations such as the UN, the OSCE, the Council of Europe and its European Court of Human Rights, which is often referred to in Ukraine as the “court of last resort.”
For example, a special rapporteur of the Council of Europe is currently preparing a report on the unlawful transfer of Ukrainian children, drawing in part on our data. Of course, a legal assessment alone cannot change the situation or force Russia to stop committing crimes.
However, beyond its legal dimension, our work also has an informational aspect.
It is important for Ukraine that the world receives truthful, objective information about the crimes against humanity committed by the Russian regime.
EVIDENCE FOR THE TRIBUNAL AGAINST PUTIN
Our Center for Civil Liberties has joined forces with dozens of regional organizations and established a nationwide network of people documenting war crimes, including in the occupied territories. We work with both personal testimonies and open sources, and send mobile teams to liberated territories.
Today, our evidence database for the tribunal against Putin already contains 34,000 records — photographs, audio files, video footage, media reports and statements from private individuals… These materials should serve as the basis for further investigations by international and national law enforcement agencies.
We strive to document every incident, even if it took place in a small Ukrainian village. Because the magnitude of each individual human tragedy is not measured by the importance of a settlement or the size of its territory.
UKRAINIANS MUST HAVE THE RIGHT TO JUSTICE
There are not many legal instruments available to bring Russian war criminals to justice. One of them is the International Criminal Court (ICC). I was the author of the first Ukrainian appeal submitted to the Court back in 2014. However, the ICC has one limitation — it does not aim to investigate every crime but instead focuses on a narrow area that it considers promising.
At present, the Court has taken up the case of the “unlawful transfer of Ukrainian children” and brought corresponding charges against Putin and Lvova-Belova. The ICC is interested in the “big fish” and does not prosecute ordinary perpetrators. But Putin is far from the only war criminal! Who will give Ukrainians whose tragedies fall outside the scope of the ICC’s investigations a chance to obtain justice?
In principle, this should be the responsibility of the Ukrainian Prosecutor’s Office dealing with international crimes.
Effectively investigating the 67,000 criminal cases currently pending there is an impossible task. That is why we must change our approach to investigating war crimes with the help of the international community.
War turns people into statistics. But people are not numbers! Justice restores people’s names by reconstructing the story of what happened to each individual. And in doing so, it restores their dignity.
THE PARADOXES OF THE ROME STATUTE
In 2014–2015, at the initiative of our organization, the Verkhovna Rada submitted two declarations accepting the jurisdiction of the ICC. Since then, the Court has had the authority to investigate international crimes committed in Ukraine, regardless of the perpetrator’s nationality. Last year, parliament passed a bill aimed at making cooperation with the ICC more effective.
However, Ukraine has still not ratified the Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the ICC. In other words, our country has undertaken an obligation to cooperate with the ICC but has not obtained the rights enjoyed by states that are parties to the Rome Statute.
We have found ourselves in an ambiguous position: the country’s leadership calls on others to prosecute Russian war criminals more actively, yet postpones ratification of the Rome Statute, which could trigger changes to a whole range of laws and regulations that would improve cooperation with the ICC.
Ukraine needs to resolve this legal dilemma as soon as possible. It has emerged from a certain political “mythology,” particularly the fear of international institutions interfering in Ukraine’s domestic affairs.
POSTWAR UKRAINE: PREDICTABILITY WITHOUT CORRUPTION
After the war, we will have a great deal of work to do to reform the judicial and law enforcement systems. In particular, we need to change how these systems respond to corruption, which has become institutionalized in our country. People want clear rules of the game. And when the legal system cannot guarantee predictability, corruption provides it instead.
Before the war, according to opinion polls, Ukrainians ranked corruption among the country’s three most serious problems. Yet when they themselves paid a bribe, for example, to secure a place for their child in kindergarten, they did not consider it corruption. Society’s values and attitudes are more powerful than any reforms.
Therefore, unless the idea of the rule of law becomes firmly established in people’s minds, fighting corruption solely through an anti-corruption court will take many decades. Corruption as a system can only be overcome by creating another system — one based on the rule of law.
When people become convinced that resolving issues through legal means is easier, faster, more convenient and fairer, corruption will decline.
A country undergoing a transition from authoritarianism to democracy has a great deal to accomplish: establishing an independent judiciary, completing decentralization, implementing economic reforms, dismantling artificial monopolies…
JUSTICE OUTSIDE THE LEGAL SYSTEM IS A THREAT TO SOCIETY
To change society’s values and attitudes, a formal declaration of commitment to the rule of law is not enough. People will believe that it is possible to live differently if they are shown something concrete and tangible. Last year, sociologists from the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) asked Ukrainians: “What could be your greatest disappointment after the war?” And 65% responded: “The impunity of Russian war criminals.”
In this sense, accountability for crimes is always something very tangible, very concrete. Justice, which establishes the inevitability of punishment for crimes, restores faith in the effectiveness of the law. And this is an essential condition for rapid democratic transformation.
We can talk endlessly about reforms and values, quote provisions from conventions and declarations, but none of this will ever convince people. The demand for justice from millions of people must be met by the justice system not merely in theory, but in practice.
Because if justice is pursued outside the legal system, we certainly will not like the way it is achieved.
Photos courtesy of Oleksandra Matviichuk
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