MOSCOW, August 21. /TASS/. Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada (parliament) has voted to ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) but with a provision exempting the country’s citizens from being prosecuted for war crimes, lawmaker Irina Gerashchenko said.
"Ukraine has ratified the Rome Statute but issued a separate statement saying that it will not recognize the ICC jurisdiction over Ukrainian nationals with regard to crimes under Article 8 of the Rome Statute (war crimes - TASS) for seven years after the ratification takes effect," she wrote on Telegram.
The ICC was established by the 1998 Rome Statute. In total, 123 countries are currently parties to the document. The court, based in The Hague, has branches in the countries where investigations are underway.
Ukraine signed the Rome Statute back on January 20, 2000, but never ratified it even though it was obliged to do so under the 2014 EU association agreement.
The countries that are not parties to the Rome Statute include Russia (signed but did not ratify it), the US (signed it but later revoked its signature) and China (never signed it). In 2016, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed an executive order saying that the country would not become a party to the ICC. According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, "the ICC has failed to live up to expectations and has not become a truly independent body of international justice."