The Foundation of American actor George Clooney will ask for arrest warrants for Russian propagandists working in Europe.
Source. This was stated in an interview with the Voice of America by Anna Neistat, Director of Legal Affairs at the Clooney Foundation for Justice's Docket project.
‘We are focused on bringing to justice the most obvious Russian propagandists, the most visible ones, but I will deliberately not name them because we ask prosecutors to issue gag orders,’ she said.
According to Neistat, unlike the Russian military and their commanders, many propagandists like to travel around Europe, have residence permits, relatives and property in different countries, and can be detained on the basis of a warrant in Europol member states.
‘That is, in any European country, in theory, they can be arrested and extradited to a country that is investigating a criminal case against them under the same universal jurisdiction,’ the lawyer said.
She explained that the Docket project collects evidence of ‘war crimes and genocide’ and then passes this information on to European prosecutors and the International Criminal Court (ICC). The project operates in Ukraine, Iraq and Venezuela.
‘At the same time, a more practical way is to bring charges of war propaganda. This is a crime that still exists in the criminal codes of several European countries. The construction of the articles there is quite interesting, but the crime itself is very simple, simpler than incitement to genocide: it is literally war propaganda,’ Neistat said.
According to her, the article on ‘propaganda of war’ is included in the criminal codes of Poland, Moldova, Slovakia and several other countries. However, it has never been applied. Neistat added that she has not yet filed a complaint with the competent authorities against Russian propagandists.
Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov called the foundation's statement ‘unacceptable’: ‘Threats against journalists, let alone reprisals against our colleagues, are absolutely unacceptable. Clooney and his wife can invent all sorts of nasty things, but their dreams are unlikely to come true,’ Solovyov said.
The Clooney Foundation for Justice was founded in 2016 by Hollywood actor George Clooney and his wife, lawyer Amal Clooney. The organisation's goal is to fight for human rights. The Foundation works in more than 40 countries.
Background. Earlier it was reported that the European Commissioner confirmed the decision to ban four Russian media outlets in the EU amid the European Parliament elections. Russian funding of NGOs, political parties and media will also be banned.