{"id":1379392,"date":"2026-04-07T18:54:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T15:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/lawyer-novikov-explained-what-ukraine-risks-due-to-the-disrupted-competition-in-the-international-criminal-court-and-what-iryna-mudra-from-the-op-has-to-do-with-it\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T18:54:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T15:54:17","slug":"lawyer-novikov-explained-what-ukraine-risks-due-to-the-disrupted-competition-in-the-international-criminal-court-and-what-iryna-mudra-from-the-op-has-to-do-with-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/lawyer-novikov-explained-what-ukraine-risks-due-to-the-disrupted-competition-in-the-international-criminal-court-and-what-iryna-mudra-from-the-op-has-to-do-with-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Lawyer Novikov explained what Ukraine risks due to the disrupted competition in the International Criminal Court and what Iryna Mudra from the OP has to do with it"},"content":{"rendered":"

The missed deadline for submitting a candidacy from Ukraine for judge of the International Criminal Court may have more serious consequences than the authorities are trying to present.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Lawyer Ilya Novikov writes<\/a> about this.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

He explains that after the ratification of the Rome Statute, Ukrainian military personnel may be prosecuted abroad on fabricated Russian charges, and the presence of a judge from Ukraine at the ICC is critically important for advancing our position on Russian aggression.<\/p>\n

“Last Monday, I wrote that the candidacy from Ukraine was never submitted on time. The competition is overseen by the Deputy Head of the President’s Office, Iryna Mudra. I have never seen her personally, but it so happened that last week our paths unpleasantly crossed twice: on Friday, the announcement of the Supreme Court’s decision on sanctions against Poroshenko was thwarted, and our sources indicate that Ms. Iryna has some connection to this. She herself, of course, denies this,” Novikov writes on Facebook.<\/p>\n

“But let’s get back to the competition. On the same day, March 30, the OP and the MFA gave a refutation that no, our train has not left yet, the deadline for accepting applications has been extended to April, we have time, everything will be a breeze. And many believed it. We are not a breeze at night, the situation is unlikely to get better for us, but it could still get worse,” warns Novikov.<\/p>\n

He explains: a judge at the ICC from Ukraine is, first of all, “soft power” that stems from familiarity with the reality on the ground.<\/p>\n

“Even if a judge’s personal military experience is limited to sitting in the corridor during the Shahids’ attack on Kyiv, it is much more than that of the rest of the judges. The presence of a person with such experience affects the atmosphere in the court and does not allow one to ignore nuances that might otherwise go unnoticed,” the lawyer writes.<\/p>\n

He warns that the decision to ratify the Rome Statute in 2024 has created additional tension for Ukrainian military and politicians: “the chance that, having gone somewhere abroad, you can be detained and extradited to The Hague due to some cunning Russian provocation will never be zero. Ukraine took the opportunity to postpone for 7 years the recognition of the ICC’s jurisdiction over its citizens for war crimes, but this extends to genocide and crimes against humanity, and the Russians know how to use this, in particular in the context of the Kursk operation of 2024-2025.”<\/p>\n

In 2024, the President’s Office made promises to the military on this topic – that appropriate work was underway, that Ukraine was supported by partners, and everything would be fine.<\/p>\n

“Theoretically, if such preparatory work had actually been carried out, everything might not have been so bad. In fact, this direction has already failed, and not because of enemy opposition or objective obstacles, but simply like most of what we fail at,” Novikov states.<\/p>\n

“Ukraine is at war, the ICC has issued an arrest warrant for Putin, it is clear that this court is more important for us than for others. We just had to think about it earlier. We had a year, even more, counting from the ratification of the Rome Statute by the Verkhovna Rada. If we wanted to have at least some real chances, we had to prepare this sled in the summer of 2025. The Ukrainian competition started on March 3, 2026 – two months after the start of accepting applications and less than a month before its end on March 29. Zelensky signed Decree No. 206\/2026 on its holding only on February 26. This is catastrophically late. The decree designated the OP and the DUS as responsible for the competition. The commission was first convened on March 2,” Novikov notes.<\/p>\n

Ukraine missed the deadline for submitting an application on Sunday, March 29: “the window closed for acceptance at midnight on March 30, the Ukrainian application was not received. Closer to noon, the Assembly secretariat sent a letter extending the nomination period until April 12 due to the fact that there is only one candidate from the Asia-Pacific region, and there must be at least two to close the nomination period. The extension of the nomination period is not an invitation for other regions. Ukraine, of course, can send its application after March 30. But it is simply not accepted. Nothing is done at the last minute in the ISS, and especially after the deadline.”<\/p>\n

“The only chance to convince the Assembly to elect a Ukrainian candidate outside the quota was the thesis “we have a war going on, it is very important for us”. And that now the Ukrainian candidate has to answer in an interview with delegations the question “if it is so important for Ukraine, then why did you miss the deadline? And why did your competition start only when everyone else’s ended?”, – the lawyer notes.<\/p>\n

“It was a mistake, we shot ourselves in the foot with our own hands. The President’s Office did this to us,” Ilya Novikov summarizes.<\/p>\n

It was previously reported that Ukraine did not submit an application for the election of judges to the International Criminal Court, missing the specified deadline.<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Also follow \u201cPryamim\u201d<\/strong> on Facebook<\/a> , X<\/a> , Telegram<\/a> , and Instagram.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The missed deadline for submitting a candidacy from Ukraine for judge of the International Criminal Court may have more serious consequences than the authorities are trying to present. Lawyer Ilya Novikov writes about this. He explains that after the ratification of the Rome Statute, Ukrainian military personnel may be prosecuted abroad on fabricated Russian charges, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":212912,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[76871,76872,76885],"class_list":["post-1379392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-2","category-news-feed","category-policy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1379392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1379392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1379392\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/212912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1379392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prm.ua\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1379392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}