Putin in Mongolia: ICC and kyiv demand his arrest, Kremlin calm

The International Criminal Court (ICC), which has issued an arrest warrant & ;against Vladimir Putin, and Ukraine have demanded Friday the arrest of the Russian president during his upcoming visit to Mongolia but the Kremlin says it is calm.

Vladimir Putin, who is serving an arrest warrant for suspected illegal deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia, is expected Tuesday in Mongolia, the first ICC member country he has visited since the warrant was issued and is therefore required to arrest him.

Like all other states parties to the Rome Statute that founded the ICC, Mongolia “has an obligation to cooperate” with it, a spokesperson for the court, Fadi el-Abdallah, told the press.

In Ukraine, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs also urged the Mongolian authorities in a statement to “transfer (Vladimir) Putin to the International Criminal Court in The Hague.”

But, according to Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov, “there is no concern” on this subject on the Kremlin's side. “We have an excellent dialogue with our Mongolian friends,” he told reporters.

“Of course, all aspects of the visit have been carefully prepared,” he added, without giving further details.

When a member country fails to meet its obligations to the ICC, the latter can refer the matter to the Assembly of States Parties, which meets once a year but whose possible sanctions are essentially limited to a verbal reprimand.

In the past, other individuals wanted by the court, such as former Sudanese dictator Omar al-Bashir, have visited countries that are signatories to the Rome Statute, without being worried.

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Mongolia signed it in 2000, before ratifying it in 2002.

– Mongolia, a courted country –

Vladimir Putin “is allegedly responsible for the war crime of illegal deportation of population (children) and illegal transfer of population (children) from the occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation,” reads the arrest warrant issued on March 17, 2023.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague © ANP – Martijn Beekman

Russia, which does not recognize the ICC, has always firmly rejected the accusations brought by this jurisdiction against the Russian president.

M. However, Putin has been careful for almost a year and a half to avoid certain trips abroad, for example skipping the BRICS summit in South Africa in August 2023, then the G20 summit in India in September of the same year.

On the other hand, he notably visited China in May, North Korea in June and Azerbaijan in mid-August, none of these countries being members of the ICC.

In Mongolia, Vladimir Putin is due to meet with his counterpart Ukhnaa Khurelsukh and take part in the celebrations of the 85th anniversary of the victory of the Soviet and Mongolian armies against Japan, at the Battle of Khalkhin Gol in 1939.

The Russian president's previous visit to Mongolia dates back to September 2019.

Mongolia is landlocked between Russia and China, which covet its rich natural resources and want to increase their influence there, as does the United States.

In early August, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken went to the Mongolian capital Ulaanbaatar to meet with “a central partner” of Washington.

French President Emmanuel Macron also traveled to Mongolia in May 2023, with which Paris wants to strengthen bilateral energy ties.

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