Mongolia asked the International Criminal Court to remove two judges — the court rejected it

Mongolia applied to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to remove Judges Salvatore Aitala and Gerardo Ugalde Godinez from ruling in Pre-Trial Chamber II because it recognized that Ulaanbaatar had violated the Rome Statute by failing to arrest Putin.

The plenary session of judges of the International Criminal Court unanimously rejected this application, the decision states.

The Plenum of Judges of the International Criminal Court noted that on October 31, 2024, it was informed of Mongoliaʼs request. In order to consider the petition, a plenary meeting of judges was convened on November 15. He was not supported.

On October 24, the ICC judges recognized that Mongolia, which did not arrest Putin during his visit to the country and did not hand him over to the court, acted contrary to the Rome Statute.

What preceded

In March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, Commissioner for Childrenʼs Rights in the Russian Federation. They are suspected of illegally deporting Ukrainian children from the occupied territories of Ukraine to Russia, which is a war crime. Putin and Lvova-Belova should be arrested as official suspects in countries that have ratified the Rome Statute. De jure, 123 countries are closed to them, including Mongolia, which ratified it in 2002.

After issuing the warrant, Putin traveled only to Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, China, the DPRK, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, and Azerbaijan. These countries have not ratified the Rome Statute, so they are not obliged to comply with the ICCʼs order.

However, during Putinʼs visit to Mongolia on September 2-3 (and this is his first visit to a member state of the International Criminal Court after issuing an arrest warrant), the politician was not arrested. As later explained in Mongolia, allegedly due to the countryʼs dependence on Russian energy products.

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