Asked by: Mark Logan (Conservative - Bolton North East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, what recent steps she has taken to support the prosecution of alleged war crimes in Ukraine.
Answered by Victoria Prentis - Attorney General
Ukrainian Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin has opened more than 100,000 files into alleged crimes which he intends to take through the Ukrainian courts.
I remain in regular contact with Prosecutor General Kostin. Alongside UK legal experts from inside and outside government, I am supporting the work of the Office of the Prosecutor General and the International Criminal Court to ensure allegations of war crimes are fully and fairly investigated, by independent, effective and robust legal mechanisms.
The UK is also a founding member of the Atrocity Crimes Advisory Group, alongside the US and the EU, which works in the region with Ukraine to coordinate and provide additional support to Ukraine’s domestic prosecutions. We have also ensured to provide training and advisory support to Ukrainian judges and prosecutors across the region.
The UK is committed to ensuring that those responsible for atrocities are held to account for their actions.
Asked by: Mark Logan (Conservative - Bolton North East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, what steps she is taking to ensure that the Crown Prosecution Service is adequately resourced to prosecute hate crime against members of religious minority communities (a) on social media and (b) in community settings.
Answered by Victoria Prentis - Attorney General
The Government is committed to delivering justice for victims of hate crimes committed in our communities and online, and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) considers all cases referred by the police.
Considering the events unfolding in the Middle East, a package of measures has been put in place to provide ongoing support to the police. This includes updating existing guidance on protests and offering the use of prosecutors in command centres to advise in real time.
In the rolling year to March 2023, the CPS has prosecuted 380 religiously aggravated and 9,1234 racially aggravated hate crime offences, with a charge rate of 85% and 87% respectively. These include aggravated malicious communication offences.