Yuri Kobzar20:01, 30.08.24

Violation of obligations to the ICC may entail certain measures against Mongolia, the organization says.

If Putin visits Mongolia next week , he is “obliged” to be arrested there, Dr Fadi El-Abdallah, spokesman for the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, told the BBC .

The trip, scheduled for Tuesday, will be the Russian dictator’s first visit to an ICC member state since the court issued an arrest warrant for him in March 2023. The Kremlin has already said it is “not worried” about the visit.

“We have excellent relations with our partners from Mongolia. Of course, all aspects of the president’s visit were carefully prepared,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow.

But an ICC spokesman says Mongolia, like other member states of the court, has “obligations to cooperate.” That includes executing arrest warrants, such as the one the court issued for Putin’s arrest in 2023.

Fadi El-Abdallah says ICC judges will look into cases of “non-cooperation” by signatory countries and report to the Assembly of States Parties, which can “take any action it deems appropriate.”

Putin is going to Mongolia: what is known

As UNIAN reported, in March last year, the ICC found the Russian president responsible for war crimes committed by Russian troops in Ukraine. In particular, for the mass deportations of children from the occupied territories of Ukraine. The court issued an arrest warrant for Putin and Russian children’s ombudsman Maria Lvova-Belova, as the two main people responsible for the deportations.

This week, it was revealed that Putin is traveling to Mongolia, which is a party to the ICC. The Russian dictator has avoided visiting such countries since the arrest warrant was issued. However, Mongolia has apparently given him assurances that it will not honor its obligations to the ICC.

Today, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry made a public appeal to Mongolia to comply with the ICC warrant and arrest the dictator.

(C)UNIAN 2024