By, Rick Neifeld, Neifeld IP Law

            Date: October 14, 2024

            What follows is a draft treaty the goal of which is to force the Russian Federation to pay for its racist barbaric genocidal invasion of Ukraine, by taxing all of Russian financial transactions with the rest of the world.

            THE RUSSIA MUST PAY FOR ITS CRIMES TREATY

I.         Legal Basis Of Revocation of All Inconsistent Treaty Obligations

            Whereas Russia's invasion of Ukraine violated the underpinnings of the UN charter, specifically, respect for fundamental human right and territorial integrity of member states and whereas the UN charter underpins all modern treaties governing commercial and state to state interactions "herein after "the Rules Based Order");

            whereas the Rules Based Order is the underpinning on which all other treaties regulating commerce between people and countries, and interactions between member states;

            whereas, by violating the Rules Based Order, the Russian Federation has lost its right to the benefit of all other treaties,

            now therefore the members of this treaty revoke, insofar as the Russian Federation and only the Russian Federation, is concerned, all obligation of all treaties inconsistent with the terms of this treaty:

II.        Effective Date

            This treaty will be come into effect upon the accession thereto, upon accession of at least ten countries including the United States of America, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Japan.

            Accession of a UN member state occurs by that state's submission of articles of accession to the World Intellectual Property Organization ("WIPO").

            A UN member state will thereafter be deemed a member of this treaty.

III.       Requirements for Accession

            Accession requires a member state to implement in their national law the following provisions:

1. Require banks and all other transferors of funds internationally to surcharge any financial transaction transmitting funds to, and any financial transaction receiving funds from, either a Russian national or Russian legal entity, ten percent of the value of the financial transaction.

2. Require banks and all other transferors of funds internationally to surcharge any financial transaction transmitting funds to, and any financial transaction receiving funds from, any entity on behalf of either a Russian national or Russian legal entity, ten percent of the value of the financial transaction.

3. Require banks and all other transferors of funds internationally to hold in trust, the principle amount of all surcharged funds. Except that banks and other holders of such trust funds may agree with another bank in the same country to transfer their trust funds to the other bank.

4. Require that, upon, and only upon, direction of the executive branch of government of the country in which the bank or transferor of funds is incorporated or, if the transferor is a real person, resides, to transfer an amount of the funds in trust, as specified by that executive branch.

5. Require that banks and all other transferors of funds internationally hold one half of accumulated amount of surcharges in trust for the Government of Ukraine, and one half of the accumulated amount of surcharges in trust for the Government of the country in which the bank or transferor of funds is incorporated or, if the transferor is a real person, resides.

6. Require that interest accumulated on funds held in such a trust accrues to the institution or person holding the funds in trust.

7. Provide for financial penalties for violation of items 1-6 that are not less than twice the value of the surcharge amount.

8. Authorize banks to impose such a surcharge on any international transfer to any country not a member of this treaty.

9. Waive bank liability for surcharges subsequently shown to be for transactions that were not to a Russian national, Russian legal entity, or any entity on behalf of either a Russian national or Russian legal entity.

10. Provide that requirements 1-9 shall remain in effect until the Government of Ukraine certifies the following:

            (1) That the country of Ukraine has been compensate for the full cost of all harm to people and property proximately caused since 2014 by Russia's invasions and attacks.

            (2) That all children of citizens of Ukraine extrajudicially removed from Ukraine by Russia have been returned to Ukraine.

             (3) That all Ukrainian citizens whose incarceration in Russia was related in any way to Russia's aggression against Ukraine since 2014 have been freed and returned to Ukraine.

            (4) That all members of Ukraine's armed forces, regardless of citizenship or origin, whose incarceration by Russia were proximately caused by their membership in Ukraine's armed forces, have been freed.

            (5) That all those people the Government of Ukraine has accused of war crimes related to Russia's invasions, since 2014, of Ukraine, have been extradited either to Ukraine or to another country prosecuting Russia's war crimes.

            (6) That the Russian Federation has withdrawn its invasion forces from the internationally recognized borders of Ukraine.