US to exit group investigating Ukraine invasion: NYT

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: The New York Times
17 Mar 2025 16:11

The US is withdrawing from a multinational group investigating leaders responsible for the Ukraine war, signaling a shift away from holding Putin accountable.

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President Donald Trump arrives at the annual St. Patrick's Day luncheon at the Capitol in Washington, on March 12, 2025. (AP)

A report by the New York Times (NYT) on Monday revealed that the US Justice Department has discreetly notified European officials of the US withdrawal from a multinational group aimed at investigating leaders responsible for the war in Ukraine, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to sources familiar with the matter.

This decision to leave the International Center for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine, which the Biden administration joined in 2023, marks a shift away from Biden's stance on holding Putin personally accountable for crimes committed against Ukrainians.

The group was established to hold the leaders of Russia, along with its allies Belarus, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), and Iran, accountable for crimes of aggression under international law, which involve violations of another country's sovereignty and are not carried out in self-defense.

According to sources familiar with the matter, the decision will be announced on Monday through an email to the staff and members of the group's parent organization, the European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation (Eurojust).

The report states that the United States was the only non-European country to collaborate with the group, sending a senior Justice Department prosecutor to The Hague to assist investigators from Ukraine, the Baltic States, and Romania.

A department spokesperson did not provide a comment by Sunday night.

Step away from WarCAT, toward Putin

According to the NYT, the Trump administration is scaling back the efforts of the War Crimes Accountability Team, established in 2022 by Attorney General Merrick B. Garland.

The team, composed of experienced prosecutors, was meant to coordinate the Justice Department's efforts to hold Russians accountable for atrocities committed following the operation three years ago. In announcing the formation of the unit, Garland declared, "There is no hiding place for war criminals," emphasizing that the department would "pursue every avenue of accountability for those who commit war crimes and other atrocities in Ukraine."

Under the Biden administration, the War Crimes Accountability Team (WarCAT) played a crucial role by offering logistical support, training, and assistance to Ukraine’s overwhelmed prosecutors and law enforcement in handling war crimes cases against Russians.

On another note, the report points out that Trump has increasingly aligned himself with Putin, while publicly clashing with Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky, even making the false claim that Ukraine provoked Russia’s brutal and illegal invasion.

“You should have never started it,” Trump said in February, referring to Ukraine’s leaders. “You could have made a deal.” He followed up in a post on social media, calling Zelensky a “Dictator without Elections” and saying he had “done a terrible job” in office.

Moreover, the Trump administration offered no specific reason for withdrawing from the investigative group, citing only the general need to redeploy resources, according to sources who spoke anonymously due to lack of authorization to discuss the matter publicly.