OTTAWA — Violence in Ukraine has crippled the country’s judicial system, the chief justice of its Supreme Court says, and left it struggling to handle tens of thousands of criminal reports arising from the war.
In a presentation given to an Ottawa conference on Monday, Justice Vsevolod Kniaziev said that more than a tenth of Ukrainian courthouses have been damaged or destroyed since Russia’s invasion of the country began earlier this year, and judges are facing threats from Russian occupiers.
But he said the system is doing its best to adapt in an attempt to fill institutional gaps and hold offenders accountable for war crimes.
“We wake up early and read the news quickly. We do not go to sleep without reading the latest news from the general staff,” he said, referring to the Ukrainian military.
He pointed to the latest statistics from Ukraine’s prosecutor general’s office, which show that more than 42,000 war crimes perpetrated by Russian actors have been registered in the country’s criminal justice system since the war began, along with some 80,000 crimes related to national security.
As the system tries to keep up with the surge in reports, it has suffered major losses, Kniaziev said.
Missiles and bombs have left 11 per cent of court premises damaged or completely destroyed, he said, and judges in occupied territories are being threatened by Russian authorities.
“Ukrainian judges cannot leave occupied territories,” said Kniaziev. “They hide from Russian military forces.”
He said that some judges have reportedly been arrested and tortured in order to intimidate other judges and try to prevent them from considering cases against Russian soldiers.
Others have taken to destroying documentation that proves their status as members of the judiciary, he added.
More than 400 new and existing judges have since been transferred across the country to fill the biggest gaps, he said. But he noted that there was already a shortage of some 2,000 judges prior to the war.
Still, Kniaziev says Ukraine will continue to document all crimes in order to eventually prosecute those responsible.
Earlier on Monday, Kniaziev met with Canada’s Supreme Court chief justice, Richard Wagner, to discuss how Canada can continue to support Ukraine.
“We are doing everything to not limit access to justice for our citizens,” said Kniaziev.
Supreme Court judges in the embattled country are donating 60 per cent of their salaries to the military, but Kniaziev said more financial support is needed to make lasting institutional changes.
Wagner said Canada will continue to be an ally to Ukraine and offer advice when needed. In the past, he said, Canada has provided guidance to improve transparency, including through the process of appointing judges.
“What the judiciary can do is to continue to provide advice and support and continue our co-operation. We will be there for Ukraine when needed,” said Wagner.
But guidance and financial support are only a part of what Kniaziev is calling for. Russia’s ongoing invasion has sparked conversation among leaders about what the consequences should be when the war ends.
“I think that this (is a) test of international justice, and it is the test of the whole system of international security,” said Kniaziev.
Judges from around the world are gathering over four days as part of the International Organization for Judicial Training. The conference is focused on helping judges to better understand vulnerable populations they interact with in the courtroom.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 31, 2022.
This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Meta and Canadian Press News Fellowship.
HALIFAX – Police have accused a Nova Scotia man of murdering a woman reported missing from the province’s Annapolis Valley after U.S. authorities detained a suspect at the Houston airport as he was preparing to board a flight to Mexico.
The RCMP say they charged 54-year-old Dale Allen Toole with first-degree murder after he was extradited by U.S. authorities and landed at Pearson International Airport in Toronto on Thursday.
RCMP Insp. Murray Marcichiw said investigators have yet to find the body of 55-year-old Esther Jones, but he said police believe there was sufficient evidence to lay the murder charge.
The search for Jones began on Labour Day after family members reported her missing.
RCMP Cpl. Jeff MacFarlane, lead investigator in the case, says Jones was last seen Aug. 31 at the Kingston Bible College in Greenwood, N.S.
MacFarlane says the accused, who is from Tremont, N.S., was not a suspect until police received key information from the Jones family and the community.
He said police executed a number of search warrants at locations in and around Annapolis County, including the communities of Kingston, Greenwood and South Tremont.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
MONTREAL – The Quebec government says Canada’s special representative on combating Islamophobia must resign, after she sent a letter to college and university heads recommending the hiring of more Muslim, Arab and Palestinian professors.
The existence of the letter, dated Aug. 30, was first reported by Le Journal de Québec, and a Canadian Heritage spokesperson says it was sent to institutions across the country.
In her letter, Amira Elghawaby says that since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in October 2023, a dangerous climate has arisen on campuses.
She says to ease tensions educational institutions should be briefed on civil liberties and Islamophobia, and that they should hire more professors of Muslim, Arab and Palestinian origin.
It was this reference to hiring that drew the immediate indignation of Quebec’s higher education minister, who called on Elghawaby to resign, saying she should “mind her own business.”
Minister Pascale Déry says hiring professors based on religion goes against the principles of secularism the province adheres to.
Speaking to reporters in the Montreal area, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that while each university will make its own hires, Elghawaby’s role is to make recommendations and encourage dialogue between different groups.
Later in Repentigny, Que., Premier François Legault criticized Trudeau for defending Elghawaby “in the name of diversity” and refusing to call for her resignation.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
VANCOUVER – A report into a triple stabbing at a festival in Vancouver’s Chinatown last year says the man accused of the crimes had been let out of a psychiatric care facility 99 times in the year prior without incident.
The report, authored by former Abbotsford Police chief Bob Rich, says the suspect in the stabbing, Blair Donnelly, was on his 100th unescorted leave from the BC Forensic Psychiatric Hospital on Sept. 10, 2023, when he allegedly stabbed three festivalgoers at the Light Up Chinatown Festival.
The external review, ordered by the provincial government after the stabbings, says Donnelly was found not criminally responsible for killing his daughter in 2006 while “suffering from a psychotic delusion that God wanted him to kill her.”
Rich’s report makes several recommendations to better handle “higher-risk patients,” including bolstering their care teams, improving policies around granting patient leaves, shoring up staff training in forensics and the use of “risk-management tools,” such as GPS tracking systems.
The B.C. Ministry of Health says it has accepted all of Rich’s recommendations and has already begun implementing them including “following new polices for granting leave privileges at the hospital.”
Court records show Donnelly is due back in Vancouver provincial court in March 2025.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
