White House defends not calling Putin a war criminal

Biden administration defends review process, cautions against calls for actions that would lead to war with Russia

White House press secretary Jen Psaki defended the Biden administration’s hesitation to refer to allegations that Russian forces are targeting civilian centres in their ongoing invasion of Ukraine as war crimes on Thursday.

The president’s top spokesperson said that allegations of the Russian military’s conduct was under review by White House experts.

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Her comments come as the UK’s prime minister, Boris Johnson, has already labelled Russia’s actions as violating internationally-recognised standards of war.

“UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson ... said that Russia’s targeting of civilians fully qualifies as a war crime. The president wouldn’t that far when he was asked yesterday. Why has he been reluctant to label Vladimir Putin’s actions a war crime?” asked a reporter.

“Well, there is a process and we have stood up a process...to evaluate evidence of what we are seeing happen on the ground. That is a standard process of the US government,” Ms Psaki responded.

She added there have been “reports of a range of barbaric tactics” including the targeting of civilians, but added that any labelling of such crimes as such would come out from standard federal channels, which typically means a declaration from the State Department.

Mr Johnson on Wednesday said flatly during prime minister’s questions that Russia’s bombing of civilian targets “already fully qualifies as a war crime”. A prosecutor at the International Criminal Court announced the beginning of a war crimes investigation over the matter on Wednesday after receiving a request for intervention from dozens of countries.

During the briefing the senior White House official also discussed the tactical information the US has announced it is sharing with Ukraine’s military, which she said did not extend to targeting information but did include “real-time” information.

“We have consistently been sharing intelligence ... that has been ongoing, and reports that suggest otherwise are inaccurate,” she said.

And asked about the possibility of the US or the west taking steps to thwart or slow down a massive Russian military convoy which is stalled but supposedly bound for Kyiv, Ms Psaki reiterated that the Biden administration was “not taking steps to prompt a war with Russia”.

Her statements come as Ukraine’s president has questioned publicly for the first time why more assistance from the Biden administration and the west did not arrive before Russia’s invasion began, while applauding that which had been delivered so far.

"I can tell you the truth. It’s a pity it began after the beginning of this war, but we have it. My appreciation to him and to his team. So we can speak now often," Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky told Fox News on Thursday.

The White House has tread a fine line in recent days by vowing a total isolation of Russia on the world stage and taking unprecedented steps to arm Ukraine while harming Russia’s economy and defence sector. At the same time, the US is pledging to not directly engage in a war with Russia and has been adamant about not using US troops to defend Ukrainian soil.