Ukraine’s Security Service charges all senators of Russia’s Federation Council with encroaching on Ukrainian territory and complicity in a war of aggression

Ukraine’s Security Service reports that it has charged, in absentia, all members of Russia’s Federation Council who supported the “unification” with Russia of Ukraine’s occupied regions with encroaching on Ukrainian territory and waging an aggressive war. Security Service representatives also note that the prosecutor general’s office has collected “a large evidentiary base” about 170 Russian senators who contributed to the occupation of Ukrainian territory.

The charges concern the senators’ ratification, in February 2022, of an “agreement on friendship, cooperation, and mutual assistance” between Russia and the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics.” Ukraine’s press release also notes that the senators supported Putin’s suggestion to use the Russian army outside of Russia’s borders.

The senators also, in April 2022, unanimously supported Russia’s annexation of occupied Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhian territories.

Andrey Klishas, head of the Federation Council Committee on Constitutional Legislation and State Building said that the charges have no legal consequences, “like the warrant from the International Criminal Court.”