The International Criminal Court 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. Pre-Trial Chamber II believes that Ulaanbaatar failed to comply with the ICCʼs request to cooperate in this case.
This was reported in the press service of the International Space Station.
By doing so, Mongolia prevented the International Criminal Court from fulfilling its functions and powers, so the Chamber referred the case to the Assembly of States Parties. The assembly will decide what to do next.
The Chamber also confirmed that personal immunity, in particular the immunity of the leaders of the countries, cannot be challenged in the ICC. States Parties and those that accept the jurisdiction of the Court are obliged to arrest and extradite those for whom there is an arrest warrant, regardless of official position or nationality.
The Rome Statute requires states parties to cooperate fully with the International Criminal Court in order to uphold its mandate.
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.
For more news and in-depth stories from Ukraine please follow us on X.