Attorney General Merrick Garland says he's investigating alleged war crimes in Ukraine
- Attorney General Merrick Garland said "we have seen the mass graves" in Ukraine.
- Garland said the Justice Department was supporting investigations of potential war crimes.
The Justice Department is assisting international efforts to examine possible war crimes committed in Russia's war on Ukraine, Attorney General Merrick Garland said Wednesday, declaring that "we have seen the mass graves" and bombed buildings.
"We have seen the dead bodies of civilians, some with bound hands, scattered in the streets," Garland said, flanked by FBI Director Christopher Wray and Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco.
"The world sees what is happening in Ukraine. The Justice Department sees what is happening in Ukraine," he added.
Garland's remarks came days after images emerged of Ukrainian civilians killed in Bucha, a town near Kyiv. Amid the mounting international anger over the atrocities allegedly committed by Russian soldiers, President Joe Biden said he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin is a "war criminal."
"This guy is brutal, and what's happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyone's seen it," Biden said.
Garland on Wednesday said the Justice Department has a "long history" of helping to hold alleged war criminals accountable. He invoked a former attorney general and Supreme Court justice, Robert Jackson, who served as the chief American prosecutor at the post-World War II Nuremberg trials.
In response to the atrocities in Ukraine, he said, a top Justice Department official in Paris has met with a French war crimes prosecutor. Garland said Justice Department officials have also met with Eurojust and Europol — a pair of law enforcement agencies to the European Union — and are assisting the top Ukrainian prosecutor.
Asked if he was calling for the creation of a Nuremberg-style tribunal, Garland said, "I'm not calling for anything at this time. Right now we're in the collection of evidence stage."
On Wednesday, Justice Department officials also announced the first charges stemming from the special task force created to hunt down the assets of Russian oligarchs closely tied to Putin. In a newly unsealed indictment, the Justice Department charged the oligarch Konstantin Malofeyev with sanctions violations, alleging that he attempted to evade the sanctions by using co-conspirators to surreptitiously acquire and run media outlets across Europe.
Just days earlier, at the Justice Department's request, Spanish authorities seized a mega yacht belonging to Viktor Vekselberg. In court papers linked to the seizure, the Justice Department said Vekselberg, the head of the Moscow-based Renova Group conglomerate, used shell companies to obfuscate his ownership of the yacht — named the "Tango" — and avoid bank oversight of transactions related to its upkeep.
"Our message to those who continue to enable the Russian regime through their criminal conduct is this: It does not matter how far you sail your yacht," Garland said Wednesday.
Garland added: "It does not matter how well you conceal your assets. It does not matter how cleverly you write your malware or hide your online activity. The Justice Department will use every available tool to find you, disrupt your plots, and hold you accountable."