Abstract
The article addresses the distinction between war crimes (Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine) and military criminal offences (Chapter XIX of the Criminal Code) in light of the 2024 implementation reform. The purpose of the study is to identify the theoretical and normative grounds for this distinction, to analyze the case law of the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court, and to formulate de lege ferenda proposals consistent with international humanitarian law and the practice of the International Criminal Court. The methodology comprises dialectical, formal-legal, systemic-structural, comparative-legal and historical-legal methods. A comparative dogmatic analysis of the two categories was carried out across the four elements of the corpus delicti. It is established that they differ in their object (the international legal order versus the established order of military service), the actus reus (a blanket construction with a contextual element and a nexus link versus a casuistic construction), the subject (a general subject coupled with the institution of command responsibility under Article 31-1 versus a special subject) and the mens rea. The overlap is confined to a situational feature: both categories arise predominantly in wartime, which creates an illusion of their proximity. The article analyses the ruling of the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court of 28 February 2024 in case No. 415/2182/20, which established the principle lex specialis derogat legi generali: serious violations of IHL norms are qualified solely under Article 438. A comparison with the legislation of Poland, Germany and France shows that, following Law No. 4012-IX, Ukraine has settled into an incorporation model close to the Polish one. Four proposals are substantiated: introducing a legal definition of a war crime in Article 438; modernizing Articles 432–435 as a reserve mechanism rather than decriminalizing them; supporting the incorporation path of implementing the Rome Statute; and refining Article 49 on the non-application of statutes of limitation to war crimes.
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