The International Court of Justice in The Hague, March 2022 The Russian invasion of Ukraine is the most brazen illegal war waged by one sovereign state against another since World War II. The Kremlin launched the invasion in clear violation of the core obligation in the UN Charter, which prohibits the “use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” Russian President Vladimir Putin has recently threatened that if Ukrainians continue to resist, they “risk the future of Ukrainian statehood.” And there is an avalanche of real-time evidence emerging from Ukraine that the Russian military is committing war crimes throughout the country—including by targeting civilians. These extraordinary acts of law-breaking have been met with equally extraordinary acts of law enforcement. The most widely discussed response to the blatantly illegal war has been an unprecedented cascade of coordinated sanctions by the United States, Europe, and much […]