ICC issues arrest warrant for Putin for war crimes in Ukraine

What are war crimes, and is Russia committing them in Ukraine?

The warrants come amid intense international pressure to hold Putin accountable for atrocities committed by Russian forces in Ukraine, and marked a highly unusual decision by the court during an ongoing conflict.

This decision is largely symbolic: Russia, like the United States, does not accept the jurisdiction of the ICC. The court does not try people in absentia – and international law experts say it is unlikely, barring a major political change in Russia, that Putin will find himself in court.

But the warrants could create difficulties for appointees to travel to countries cooperating with the court. And for Putin – the first permanent member of the UN Security Council against whom the ICC has issued an arrest warrant – it is a blow to his reputation, as his war in Ukraine continues. in its second year with no end in sight.

Senior Ukrainian and European officials hailed the announcement as a crucial step towards holding Russia accountable. In a speech, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the indictment warrants “state policy, state decisions, state evil” of Russia.

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Putin issued a decree last May to make it easier for Russians to adopt Ukrainian children. Ukrainian authorities are investigating more than 16,000 incidents of forcible removal of children from Ukraine to Russian-held territory, according to Andri KostinProsecutor General of Ukraine.

Lvova-Belova, who reports directly to Putin, has been the official face of Moscow’s efforts to bring Ukrainian children into Russian territory. She worked with colleagues to hand over dozens of children from Donetsk to Russian families and coordinated the transfer of children to orphanages in Donetsk and Luhansk, in occupied eastern Ukraine, to the care of Russian citizens. , according to the Kremlin.

A religiously devout mother of 22 who openly advocates stripping children of their Ukrainian identity, Lvova-Belova herself adopted a teenage orphan, Filip, from the occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol. In August, she told a conference in the Far Eastern city of Vladivostok that Filip needed to change his Ukrainian ways.

Lvova-Belova has insisted that none of the children have Ukrainian relatives, while Ukrainian officials say they all belong to Ukraine. By November, more than 10,000 Ukrainian children had been reported by relatives, family members or friends as having been taken to Russia without their parents, Daria Herasymchuk, Ukraine’s top human rights official, said in November. ‘child.

Rights groups have called the transfers a deliberate Russian strategy to destroy Ukrainian identity.

The United States, Britain, the European Union, Canada, Australia and Switzerland imposed sanctions on Lvova-Belova for forced adoptions of Ukrainian children. She calls the accusations “false”.

The arrest warrants, issued quickly by international law standards, come more than a year after ICC Prosecutor General Karim Khan announced an investigation into possible violations of international humanitarian law in Ukraine. Although Kyiv was not a party to the court, it had previously accepted the court’s jurisdiction over its territory.

“Incidents identified by my office include the deportation of at least hundreds of children abducted from orphanages and children’s homes,” he said, in circumstances that “demonstrate an intent to permanently remove these children of their own country”.

Under the Fourth Geneva Convention, it is illegal for an occupying power to forcibly transfer or expel protected persons from occupied territory.

The warrants accuse Lvova-Belova and Putin of direct participation in the abduction and deportation of children, and say that Putin is responsible “for his failure to exercise proper control over the civilian and military subordinates who committed the acts” , the court said in its announcement.

Some experts and rights advocates have called for senior Russian officials to be prosecuted for crimes against humanity or genocide, in addition to war crimes. The forcible transfer of children may be considered an act of genocide under the 1948 Genocide Convention. But successful prosecution would require demonstrating an intent to at least partially destroy Ukrainians as a national group – a case more difficult to prove.

Kremlin officials rejected the warrants and vowed not to cooperate.

“The decisions of the International Criminal Court have no meaning for our country,” said Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, on Friday.

“No need to explain WHERE this document is to be used,” Dmitry Medvedev, deputy head of Russia’s Security Council and former president of the country, said in a statement. Tweeteralongside a toilet paper emoji.

Theoretically, the 123 states parties to the ICC should surrender Putin to the court if he visits their territory. But Sergei Markov, a former Putin adviser and propagandist, wrote on Telegram that the mandate would have no practical effect, since Putin will not visit “hostile countries” anyway.

It’s highly unusual for the ICC to issue war crimes warrants when the conflict is ongoing, says American University law professor Robert Goldman – and ‘rather unprecedented’ to prosecute a leader of state, although the ICC issued arrest warrants for former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir when he was in power. South Africa has been criticized for not arresting Bashir during his trip to the country.

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The alleged forcible transfer of children is a “very serious war crime”, Goldman said. But he expressed concern that continued legal action against Putin could complicate the eventual pursuit of a peace deal.

“It gives Ukraine a very strong argument to say that as a condition of a settlement, either we are not going to deal with the guy who is wanted for war crimes, or that this person must be handed over to the ICC for pay for his crimes,” an unrealistic proposition, Goldman said.

But other international law experts and rights groups have said arrest warrants could deter future unlawful behavior and bring comfort to victims of alleged crimes.

It’s not just prosecutions that deliver justice, said Mark Kersten, an international justice expert at the University of the Fraser Valley, but “the process of holding people to account and speaking out loud and clear, from La Haye and the world: “We are on your side, and we believe that what happened to you was an atrocity.

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Mary Ilyushina, Francesca Ebel, Emily Rauhala, David L. Stern, Natalia Abbakumova and Beatriz Rios contributed to this report.