How Team Putin will be brought to justice

President Putin cares so little for international law that he drops bombs on Kiev when the secretary-general of the UN visits Ukrainian President Zelensky. Russia is one of 42 states that do not recognise the International Criminal Court, so its jurisdiction doesn’t extend to Russian presidents or generals accused of war crimes.

It would be easy to conclude that international law is impotent when faced with Putin’s ‘‘ramraid’’ of Ukraine in broad daylight. That would be a mistake. The process of bringing him to justice is already under way.

The more we see this machinery of justice start to spark up, the sooner the war is likely to end. It will help to deter future power-hungry aggressors.

A few years ago I realised that if I was going to have rabidly positive opinions about international law, my degree in political theatre was going to get me only so far. So I went back to university to study international law.

I learned that New Zealand has a proud history of standing up to mass murderers. In 1994 we were a lone voice calling for the international community to intervene in Rwanda to stop a genocide. We failed, but Rwanda never forgot. In 2014 its was the deciding vote that got New Zealand on to the UN Security Council.

Such is our commitment to international law that our defence forces and aid charities get together every few years to role-play a pretend war in our region. They practise how New Zealand would keep the peace and prevent war crimes.

We take the exercise seriously. Almost too seriously. Apparently a staff member from a government department acting the role of president of the pretend invaded country was caught off guard one time when an official, in character, rushed into the war room to breathlessly deliver his prepared lines: ‘‘Mrs President, your husband has gone to the other side.’’ She looked confused and responded, ‘‘He’s gay?’’

Some from the aid sector were so committed to a humanitarian rule forbidding anyone in a military uniform from entering a refugee camp that they refused entry to the real admiral, who was there to observe the war exercise. Behind them, the citizens of Blenheim, unaware of this display of method acting, were having way too much fun pretending to be war victims.

This week, New Zealand Red Cross held its annual fake court case, where budding students of international law compete against each other in a mock trial of an alleged war criminal.

The fantastically named pretend Kingdom of Momaayo, with a vast number of baobab trees, has been invaded by the equally fake Republic of Kissaka, which wants the kingdom’s oil. The Kissaka army has killed 170 civilians and some UN peacekeepers, and destroyed 25,000 baobab trees.

The students divide into defence and prosecution teams to showcase a fair trial and bring Kissaka’s president to justice. Red Cross is making sure some will go on to become real international lawyers who promote the Geneva Convention and humanitarian law. One of these students might bring a real murdering president to justice one day. Someone like President Putin.

Ukraine’s government and experts from the International Criminal Court are on the ground now collecting evidence of war crimes. But they must establish a legal connection between specific crimes on the battlefield and instructions from the Kremlin, so it’s difficult to prove the direct guilt of Putin and Russia’s political leaders.

Since Russia doesn’t recognise the jurisdiction of the court, the fear is that the international system will only ever deliver low-grade army officials to court, while the leadership who started this war goes free.

Ukraine is calling for a Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression to be set up now. The act of aggression is called the mother of all crimes because leaders should be culpable for crimes committed in the field even without a direct link; their decision to invade another country illegally is the fundamental crime from which stems all other war crimes.

A Special Tribunal can be set up straightaway so the world can see that, soon, justice will be done. Once it starts to prepare indictments and issue arrest warrants, it will prove that international law has muscle. It will help to end the war sooner when Team Putin begins to realise it can’t evade consequences forever. Russia-friendly countries will think twice before shaking the blood-soaked hands of international criminals.

While Ukraine is fighting for its right to exist, countries like New Zealand with a proud reputation for standing up for international law should support Ukraine’s call for this Special Tribunal. If we can pretend to do it in exercises, we can do it in real life.

With a Special Tribunal set up, Russiafriendly countries will think twice before shaking the bloodsoaked hands of international criminals.