International Criminal Court Issues Arrest Warrant For Putin

The Pre-Trial Chamber of the UN-backed International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for President Vladimir Putin of Russia on Friday, in connection with alleged war crimes concerning the deportation and “illegal transfer” of children from occupied Ukraine, the head of the ICC said. “The contents of the warrants are secret to protect the victims,” said ICC President Piotr Hofmański. “Nevertheless, the judges decided to make the existence of the warrants public, in the interest of justice and to prevent future crimes.” The ICC Pre-Trial Chamber II also issued a warrant for the arrest of Russia’s Commissioner for Children’s Rights Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova. The orders state that each are “allegedly responsible for the war crime of unlawful deportation” of children from occupied territories in Ukraine to Russia, the UN-backed court said in announcing the warrants. ‘Criminal responsibility’ “The crimes were allegedly committed in Ukrainian occupied territory at least from 24 February 2022,” the ICC detailed. “There are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr. Putin and Ms. Lvova-Belova bear individual criminal responsibility.” The court found reasonable grounds that Mr. Putin bears responsibility for having committed the acts directly, jointly with others and, or through others, and “for his failure to...