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Moscow Legalizes Rape in Ukraine If Beneficial to the War Effort
Quite remarkably, Russia made public a change in how it administers its troops fighting in Ukraine. No longer would crimes by Russian soldiers be prosecuted if that crime benefitted the Russian military.
The Russian state Duma on Wednesday adopted the first reading of a bill saying that any offenses committed in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson, before the four Ukrainian regions were annexed on Sept 30, “will not be considered a crime punishable by law” if they are deemed to have been “in the interest of the Russian Federation (Russia to Scrap Punishments)”.
Punishments for crimes are being scrapped in the four regions Moscow claims now belong to Russia, a reality being viciously resisted by Ukrainian troops. Ukrainian partisan activities in the four regions have also clearly caused problems for Moscow so to remedy the problem chaos is being legalized.
As is so typical when Russia passes legislation that demonstrates just how far it has drifted from the values of civilized, and democratic nations, the law being drafted is purposely ambiguous. How does one prove a crime by a Russian soldier against a Ukrainian citizen wasn’t an act meant to benefit Russia’s war interest?