The European Commission has adopted a proposal to start the process for the European Union to become a founding member of a new Special Tribunal set up to prosecute the crime of aggression against Ukraine.
EU member states must approve the proposal before the Commission can formally notify the EU’s intention to join as a founding member, the European External Action Service (EEAS) announced on Thursday.
If approved, the EU would take part in running the tribunal, including by sitting on a Management Committee that will govern it.
The tribunal will have a mandate to prosecute senior political and military leaders for the crime of aggression against Ukraine.
The tribunal is being created within the framework of the Council of Europe, following the signing on 25 June 2025 of an agreement between Ukraine and the Council of Europe to establish it.
Funding and wider support
The EEAS said the EU has contributed to drafting the tribunal’s founding legal texts, which were politically endorsed by an international coalition of states and international organisations on 9 May 2025.
It also stated the EU supports accountability work through the International Centre for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine — a body focused on building cases linked to the alleged crime of aggression — and has provided a €10 million contribution to the tribunal’s Advance Team to help prepare its operational set-up.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said “the pursuit of justice is equally a deterrent for would-be aggressors” and described the process of setting up legal proceedings as requiring “time, effort and the widest possible international support”.
Michael McGrath, the European Commissioner for Democracy, Justice, the Rule of Law and Consumer Protection, referred to atrocities in Bucha and declared, “there can be no just peace without accountability.”
