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Congress Votes to Expand U.S. Power to Prosecute International War Crimes [1]

['Aishvarya Kavi']

Date: 2022-12-22

Dec. 23: This article was updated with a statement from the attorney general.

WASHINGTON — Congress gave final approval on Thursday to a bill to expand the U.S. government’s power to prosecute international war crimes suspects who are in the United States, allowing them to be tried in a federal court regardless of the nationality of the victim or the perpetrator, or where the crime was committed.

Experts say the legislation, shepherded by a bipartisan group of lawmakers amid reports of Russian forces committing war crimes in the brutal conflict in Ukraine, brings the U.S. legal code in line with international law and prevents the United States from being seen as a potential haven for war criminals.

The bill, called the Justice for Victims of War Crimes Act, now goes to President Biden. It sped through the Senate and then the House in the hours surrounding a congressional address on Wednesday night by President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, who condemned President Vladimir V. Putin’s Russia for targeting civilians and urged the United States to continue sending financial and military aid amid a winter assault.

“By passing this vital legislation, we are sending a clear message to Vladimir Putin: Perpetrators committing unspeakable war crimes, such as those unfolding before our very eyes in Ukraine, must be held to account,” Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, said in a statement on Thursday. Mr. Durbin, as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, helped spearhead the legislation along with Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the panel’s top Republican.

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[1] Url: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/22/us/politics/congress-war-crimes.html

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