Vladimir Putin has a warrant for his arrest from the International Criminal Court (ICC).
The court has concentrated its allegations against him on the forcible deportation of children from Ukraine to Russia. The court argues he is accountable for war crimes.
It claims that beginning on February 24, 2022, when Russia began its full-scale invasion, atrocities were committed in Ukraine.
The charges have been refuted by Russia, which has called the warrants “outrageous”.
It is quite doubtful that the measure will have a significant impact because Russia is not a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC), which does not have the authority to arrest suspects.
The president might be impacted in other ways, like his inability to go abroad.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) claimed in a statement that it had good reason to suspect that both Mr. Putin acted alone and in concert with others to conduct the crimes. Additionally, he was charged with neglecting to exercise his executive authority to halt the deportation of minors.
US Vice President Joseph Biden responded, “Well, I think it’s legitimate,” when questioned about the ICC’s action. “But I think it makes a pretty good point,” he said, noting that the US has not ratified the ICC. Putin “certainly committed war crimes,” the speaker claimed.
Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s commissioner for children’s rights, is also sought by the ICC for the same offenses.
She has previously been outspoken about efforts to brainwash Ukrainian youngsters sent to Russia.
In September of last year, Ms. Lvova-Belova expressed her displeasure over some kids who had been removed from Mariupol because they “talked poorly about the [Russian President], said nasty things, and sang the Ukrainian anthem.”
Also, she has stated that she adopted a 15-year-old kid from Mariupol.
The ICC claimed that while initially contemplating keeping the arrest warrants private, it ultimately opted to release them in the case that it prevented other crimes from being committed.
Children “cannot be treated as the spoils of war, they cannot be deported,” ICC prosecutor Karim Khan told the BBC.
“One doesn’t have to be a lawyer to understand how awful this type of crime is, one just has to be a human being,” he said.
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Within minutes of the release, responses to the warrants emerged, and Kremlin officials immediately discounted them.
The court’s decisions, according to the spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, are “null and worthless,” while the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev likened the warrant to toilet paper.
He tweeted with the emoji for toilet paper, “No need to clarify WHERE this paper should be used.
Leaders of the opposition in Russia, however, hailed the news. Ivan Zhdanov, a close friend of Alexei Navalny, the imprisoned opposition leader, tweeted that it was “a symbolic move” but a crucial one.
The criminal court’s decision to file charges against “state evil,” according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, is something for which he is grateful.
Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin claimed the judgment was “historic for Ukraine”, while the country’s presidential chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, welcomed the move as “just the beginning”. Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova have very little possibility of testifying at The Hague because Russia has not ratified the ICC.
According to Jonathan Leader Maynard, a lecturer in international politics at King’s College London, Russia is “clearly not going to cooperate in this respect” because the ICC needs the cooperation of states to make arrests.
The Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic, who was tried for war crimes in Croatia, Bosnia, and Kosovo, was not expected to end up in The Hague, Mr. Khan noted.
He advised those who believed they could commit a crime during the day and yet get a good night’s sleep to consider history.
Yet, this does pose a legal issue for Mr. Putin.
While Mr. Putin is the leader of a G20 nation and is going to shake hands with China’s Xi Jinping in a historic summit, he is also currently wanted for questioning, which will obviously limit the nations he can visit.
Also, it is embarrassing for the Kremlin, which has consistently refuted claims that it committed war crimes, that a powerful, international organization like the ICC would not accept its denials.
