Ukraine: International Claims Commission Convention

Lord Boateng Excerpts

Tuesday 30th June 2026 Grand Committee

[Lord Boateng (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the indulgence of the chair and the committee for the opportunity to speak in the gap in this important debate. I express at the outset gratitude to our chair for his role in the presentation of this report as well as for his opening remarks, and of course to the secretariat, which assisted us in the course of our deliberations.

The establishment of an International Claims Commission for Ukraine strengthens a broader moral and legal principle. Where aggression causes mass harm, victims should have a structured route to truth, recognition, compensation and restitution. The Ukraine mechanism builds on a Council of Europe register of damage, and it is intended to assess claims for damage, loss or injury caused by Russia’s internationally wrongful acts. That is the first point that I want to draw to the attention of the Minister and to seek a response from her on.

The role of the Minister’s department and her personally in driving forward this treaty and all that flows from it is a welcome one. However, it is important to recognise that Russia’s wrongdoing is international. She has been at the forefront—she spoke on this only this week and indeed last week—of highlighting the tragedy currently unfolding in Sudan. Russia is an active participant in that country, with a view to obtaining access to its gold and rare minerals.

The fact of the matter is that the reconstituted Wagner Group is playing an active role on the ground, fomenting and fuelling the conflict. During the last Conservative Government, as the chair of the Sir Winston Churchill Archive Trust, I was privileged to be present at an awards ceremony for the President of Ukraine, which had been initiated by the then Prime Minister, Boris Johnson. At the reception, I met Ukrainians who were witnesses to the activities of the Wagner Group, which they had seen operate on their own territory as well as in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The group is also present in the Sahel.

I do hope that, in putting forward this important initiative in relation to an international claims commission for a European country, we will see a similar degree of enthusiasm, determination and drive to ensure that international law is upheld in Sudan. I also hope that those who are responsible for the harm and loss being suffered by the Sudanese people will be similarly pursued and brought to justice, with compensation sought for these people. I say this because we need to be consistent in our concern for the application of international law; that has not always been the case. I hope that the Minister will use her considerable talents and those of her department to make sure that the issue of reparations in Sudan is also addressed.

My final point is that, as the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Prentis, said, we need to be the leaders of the pack here. If we are to do that, we need to be ethically consistent. This means that we are going to have to respond to the work that is being done in the UN as we speak on looking at the wider historical injustices that have occurred in the past as a result of colonial aggression. We will be strengthened in leading the pack on current issues in relation to Ukraine if we are ethically consistent in our response to the demands made by Barbados and Ghana, which are backed by a large number of countries—the majority of the United Nations, in fact—in terms of looking for restitution and reparation for historical crimes.