A court in The Hague has issued a warrant for the arrest of Russian President Vladimir Putin and children’s ombudsman Maria Lvova-Belova. They are accused of illegally deporting children from the occupied territories of Ukraine to Russia. This is reported on the website of the court.
“There are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr. Putin and Mrs. Lvova-Belova are individually criminally responsible for the aforementioned crimes,” the court said on its website.
Earlier, Ukrainian authorities reported that Russia had removed more than 16,000 children from Ukraine.
“The decisions of the International Criminal Court have no significance 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 has no obligations under it. Russia is not cooperating with this body, and possible arrest ‘prescriptions’ coming from the International Court of Justice will be legally null and void for us,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova wrote.
On 13 March, The New York Times quoted its sources as saying that the ICC would soon open two cases against Russian officials over alleged crimes in Ukraine: one for deporting Ukrainian children and the other for deliberate attacks on civil infrastructure.
