Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kęstutis Budrys has asked prosecutors at the International Criminal Court to look into whether Russia’s attacks on Ukraine’s energy sector and civilian infrastructure amount to genocide, the Foreign Ministry said Friday.
Budrys urged the court to consider issuing new arrest warrants for Russian officials responsible for the strikes and to expand existing warrants to include additional international crimes, including genocide.
“These systematic attacks, clearly aimed at leaving Ukraine’s population without electricity, heating and water in the midst of extreme winter cold, cannot be qualified in any other way than as an intentional attempt to physically destroy Ukrainians as a group,” Budrys wrote in a letter to ICC prosecutors, according to the ministry.
The appeal comes as Russia continues large-scale attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure. Ukraine’s air force said Friday that Russia launched a missile and more than 100 drones overnight, despite US President Donald Trump saying Moscow had agreed to halt strikes on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities.
Russian strikes on Ukraine’s energy grid have repeatedly disrupted electricity, heating and water supplies for millions of civilians, exacerbating what Ukrainian authorities and international organisations describe as a humanitarian crisis in the war-ravaged country.
The ICC, based in The Hague, is the main international criminal justice body investigating alleged international crimes committed during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
In March 2023, the court issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s commissioner for children’s rights, over the alleged unlawful deportation of Ukrainian children. In 2024, the ICC also issued warrants for Russia’s former defence minister and senior military commanders.
To date, the ICC’s warrants related to the war in Ukraine have covered alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity. Lithuania is now urging prosecutors to consider whether the sustained attacks on civilian infrastructure meet the legal threshold for genocide under international law.
Russia denies targeting civilians and rejects the ICC’s jurisdiction.
Newsletter
Every Friday morning.
