The French Foreign Ministry announced the start of the work to establish a special tribunal against Russia in connection with the conflict in Ukraine, TASS reports with reference to a representative of the French Foreign Ministry.
Paris started working on the tribunal in cooperation with foreign partners.
France also supports the investigations of Ukrainian law enforcement agencies and the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague to bring those responsible for those crimes to justice, the source also said.
On November 30, the European Commission, headed by Ursula von der Leyen, initiated the creation of a special international court for Ukraine under the auspices of the UN.
Von der Leyen also proposed to set up a structure that would manage Russia's frozen assets. The EC clarified that the funds should be used to compensate for the damage that Ukraine suffered during the special operation.
"Russia must also pay financially for the devastation that it caused. The damage suffered by Ukraine is estimated at 600 billion euros. Russia and its oligarchs have to compensate Ukraine for the damage and cover the costs for rebuilding the country. And we have the means to make Russia pay. We have blocked 300 billion euros of the Russian Central Bank reserves and we have frozen 19 billion euros of Russian oligarchs' money," Ursula von der Leyen said on November 30.
Russian Ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzya commented on Von der Leyen's initiative to create a tribunal under the auspices of the UN. Nebenzya called this idea an attempt to attach legitimacy to the seizure of Russian assets.
Assessing the idea of the EU, the diplomat called it "an example of what they call "an international order based on rules" — they come up with these rules and then pass them off as universal," the official said.
"They will try to justify this with a General Assembly resolution, trying to give this lawlessness some form of legitimacy. That's what they need it for," Russian Ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzya said.
EU representatives "want to obtain a 'pressed through' decision of the General Assembly" when it adopted a resolution on Russia's reparations to Ukraine. The General Assembly does not have the competence to make such decisions — this is a prerogative of the UN Security Council, Nebenzya added.
According to Kremlin's official spokesman Dmitry Peskov, attempts of the Western countries to set up a tribunal for Ukraine will not be legitimate. Russia will only condemn such attempts, he added, TASS reports.
"As for attempts to establish some kind of tribunals, they will not have any legitimacy. We are not going to accept them — we are going to condemn them," the Kremlin spokesman said.