MOSCOW, March 3. /TASS/. The Russian authorities by no means try to excuse any actions that cause the death of civilians, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview to Russian and foreign mass media on the crucial and international agenda.
"I wish to stress once more that I am not trying to excuse any actions that result in the death of civilians, but it was not us that coined the term ‘collateral damage’. It was used by our Western counterparts in Iraq, and before that in other countries in Latin America and in Libya," Lavrov said when asked by a British journalist if Russia was considering a strategy of defense in the International Criminal Court.
The ICC chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, has said that he will send a request to the pre-trial chamber for launching a full-scale probe into the situation in Ukraine. Earlier, 38 countries urged the ICC to look into suspected war crimes in that country.
Ukraine is not an ICC member, but it has filed two lawsuits, thus recognizing the court’s jurisdiction, over suspected crimes committed in its territory since November 21. As a result of the preliminary inquiry, the ICC Office of the Prosecutor said it had identified sufficient reasons for a full-scale investigation of likely military crimes and crimes against humanity. In the wake of the conflict’s expansion Khan said on February 28 the investigation would encompass all other suspected crimes that fall under the ICC jurisdiction, committed by any party to the conflict.
The Kremlin has emphatically dismissed Khan’s remarks there were allegedly sufficient reasons for opening a case against Russia over Ukraine.