Members of the International Criminal Court are bound to detain suspects if an arrest warrant has been issued, but the court doesn’t have any enforcement mechanism.
Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived on his first official visit to Mongolia late on Monday.
But despite calls by the EU, the ICC and Ukraine for him to be arrested, Putin was instead warmly welcomed at the international airport in the capital Ulaan Bator by the foreign minister Batmunkh Battsetseg.
It was not clear, however, why Mongolia’s president, Ukhnaa Khürelsükh, was not there to welcome him in person, and it appeared to be somewhat of a diplomatic snub.
The official visit comes amid an international warrant for his arrest nearly 18 months ago on charges of war crimes in Ukraine.
Putin and Khürelsükh are to attend a ceremony on Tuesday marking the 1939 victory of Soviet and Mongolian troops over the Japanese army that had taken control of Manchuria in northeastern China.
Thousands of soldiers died in months of fighting in a dispute over where the border was between Manchuria and Mongolia.
Before the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Mongolia was a Soviet satellite state.
EU and Ukraine call for Putin’s arrest
Ukraine has called on Mongolia to arrest Putin and hand him over to the court in The Hague. Kyiv’s foreign ministry said it “hopes that the Mongolian government will realise the fact that Vladimir Putin is a war criminal”.
The European Commission has also called on Mongolia to fulfil its obligations to the ICC and place Putin under arrest.
“Mongolia is a state party to the Rome Statute of the ICC since 2002 with the legal obligations that it entails. We have raised our concern about the visit and stated our position of the ICC clearly via our delegation in Mongolia,” a Commission spokesperson said on Monday, referring to the treaty that underpins the tribunal.
“The EU supports the investigation by the prosecutor of the ICC in Ukraine, and we call for the cooperation by all state parties.”
Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said last week that the Kremlin isn’t worried about the visit.
Members of the international court are bound to detain suspects if an arrest warrant has been issued, but the court doesn’t have any enforcement mechanism.
The ICC has accused Putin of being responsible for the abductions of children from Ukraine, where the fighting has raged for two and a half years.
Putin hasn’t travelled to ICC member states ever since the arrest was issued in March 2023. Though the Russian leader has faced international isolation over the invasion of Ukraine, he did visit North Korea and Vietnam last month and has also visited China twice in the past year.
ADVERTISEMENTHowever, last year he skipped a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies in South Africa.
He instead joined the meeting in Johannesburg by video link after the South African government lobbied against him showing up for the BRICS summit, a group that also includes China and other emerging economies.
South Africa lobbied Moscow for months for Putin not to attend to avoid the diplomatic fallout since the country is an ICC member. Ultimately, the countries announced a “mutual agreement” that Putin would not attend in person a meeting he’s normally a fixture at.
The Kremlin and the ICC’s jurisdiction
Russia is not a party to the Rome Statute, so the Kremlin dismissed the ICC warrant on Putin as “null and void”. Recently, it has bristled at allies attempting to join the Hague-based court.
ADVERTISEMENTArmenia’s decision to join the ICC added to the growing tensions between Moscow and Yerevan last year. Armenian officials, however, quickly sought to assure Russia that Putin wouldn’t be arrested if he entered the country.
ICC spokesperson Fadi El Abdallah underscored in a statement on Friday that Mongolia “is a state party to the ICC Rome Statute” and thus must cooperate with the court.
“The ICC relies on its states parties and other partners to execute its decisions, including in relation to arrest warrants,” the official said, adding: “In case of non-cooperation, ICC judges may make a finding to that effect and inform the Assembly of States Parties of it.”
It is then for the assembly to take any measure it deems appropriate.” It wasn’t clear from the statement what kind of measures could be enforced.
ADVERTISEMENTMongolia, a sparsely populated country between Russia and China, heavily depends on the former for fuel and electricity and the latter for investment in its mining industry.
It was among the 94 countries that signed in June a joint statement declaring their “unwavering support” for the ICC after Prosecutor Karim Khan faced a backlash for seeking arrest warrants against two Israeli officials, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and three Hamas leaders.
One of the sitting ICC judges, Erdenebalsuren Damdin, is from Mongolia.