ICC’s arrest warrant for President Putin
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued a global warrant for the arrest of President Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation for allegedly committing war crimes.
Advertisement
Issued on February 22, 2023, the warrant stated that Mr Putin was allegedly responsible for the war crimes for unlawful deportation and transfer of children from the occupied areas of Ukraine to Russia.
According to the warrant, the alleged deportation and transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia was in violation of Articles 8 (2) (vii) and 8(2) (b) (viii) of the Rome Statute.
“There are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr Putin bears individual criminal responsibility for the aforementioned crimes.”
It said that Mr Putin allegedly “committed the acts directly, jointly with others and (or through others) in breach of Article 25 (3) (a) of the Rome Statute”.
Mr Putin’s failure to exercise control properly over civilian and military subordinates who were under his effective authority and control pursuant to superior responsibility were in breach of article 28(b) of the Rome Statute, according to the warrant.
President Putin
On the ICC’s warrant, the Court’s prosecutor, Karim Khan, has said the warrant to arrest President Putin was “based upon forensic evidence, scrutiny and what has been said by Mr Putin”.
“Children can’t be treated as spoils of war, they can’t be deported,” Mr Khan said.
“This type of crime doesn’t need one to become a lawyer; one needs to be a human being to know how egregious it is,” he added.
A report published earlier by a United Nations-backed independent International Commission of Inquiry has said it found that Russia had perpetuated large-scale violations of international human rights and humanitarian norms in Ukraine.
According to the report, some of the violations committed – since the start of the Ukraine war on February 24, 2023 -- amounted to war crimes.
It mentioned willful killings of unarmed civilians, torture, unlawful confinement, rape and other forms of sexual violence, and forced deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia from Ukraine -- as some of the violations.
Ukrainian authorities had reported earlier that 16,221 of Ukrainian children had been deported to Russia.
However, the Russian authorities have denied all the allegations made against it and its current president, Mr Vladimir Putin.
Mr Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for the Russian government, has said none of the court’s decisions had any legal effects on Russia and that they would be null and void.
Former president of Russia, Mr Dmitry Medvedev, has described the ICC’s warrant for President Putin’s arrest as toilet paper.
Russia’s spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, has said that the “decisions of the ICC have no meaning for our country, including from a legal point of view.
“Russia is not a party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and bears no obligations under it,” she added.
In reaction, the ICC president, Piot Hofmanski, has said that it was “completely irrelevant” that Russia is not a party to the Rome Statute.
“According to the ICC Statute which has 123 state parties, two-thirds of the whole international community, the Court has jurisdiction over crimes committed in the territory of a state party or a state which has accepted its jurisdiction,” he said further.
“Ukraine has accepted the ICC twice – in 2014 and in 2015.”
He added that “43 states had referred the situation in Ukraine to the Court, which means that they have formally triggered jurisdiction.”
Slobodan Milosevic
Sir Geoffrey Nice, an ICC former prosecutor who served as the prosecutor in the trial of former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, has commented that the issuance of the warrant would change the way world leaders view Mr Putin.
“He will remain an alleged criminal until and unless he submits himself for trial and is acquitted.”
“That seems extremely unlikely; so, he will remain an alleged criminal until the end of his life,” he added.
The ICC was founded in 1998 and came into force in 2002 after the Rome Statute was ratified.
It is the only permanent international criminal court that has jurisdiction to try individuals for international crimes – genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and crimes of aggression.
Since its establishment, the ICC has tried 31 cases; the ICC judges have issued 38 arrest warrants; and 21 persons have been detained in its detention centre and have been tried.
The court has convicted 10 persons and acquitted four.
Among heads of state that have been arrested and tried by the ICC include former Serbian president, Slobodan Milosevic; former President Charles Taylor of Liberia, former President of Ivory Coast, Laurent Gbagbo, and one-time president of Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta.
Former President Gbagbo won his case on appeal and the case against Uhuru Kenyatta was dropped for insufficient evidence.
An ICC arrest warrant was issued against Omar al-Bashir of Sudan while in office but has not been arrested, even after his removal in a military takeover in 2019.
Is it likely President Putin will be arrested and tried?
The ICC has powers of arrest but cannot do so without the cooperation and collaboration of a country where an arrest is to be made.
Russia is not a party and not a signatory to the Rome Statute.
Therefore, the Rome Statute has very little impact in Russia.
However, Mr Putin can be arrested if he steps outside Russia to where a collaborative government in that country can assist in his arrest and transfer to the Hague, Netherlands, where the ICC headquarters are based.
Mr Putin is the third sitting president to be issued with an arrest warrant – after al-Bashir and Muamar Gadhafi, former leader of Libya.
It has proved difficult for the ICC to arrest a sitting president.
None of such personalities issued with arrest warrants have been arrested and tried.
That may be the case with the arrest warrant for Mr Putin.
However, the moral, diplomatic and economic effects of the issuance can be unpalatable for the Russian Federation and its leader, Mr Putin.
The arrest warrant can make Russia and Russians lose face in the eye of the international community.
Mr Putin now, and after stepping down as president, would appear an alleged criminal until he has been tried and acquitted.
Russia
It appears that Russia, a world power, would become more isolated and its economic sphere of operation would become narrow.
However, with the recent visit of President Xi of China to Russia, it is believed that a new era of Russia/China cooperation has opened. That is important leverage for Russia.
Russian/Chinese political and economic cooperation would increase but closer military collaboration is not likely.
This is because China is likely to face economic and other sanctions from Western countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom, member states of the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation – if Russia/China military cooperation deepens.
Email: [email protected]