Russia-Ukraine war live: Biden welcomes Putin arrest warrant as UK says Moscow likely to expand conscription US president says international criminal court’s warrant ‘makes a very strong point’ while Moscow rejects move as ‘meaningless’

 

Russia-Ukraine war live: Biden welcomes Putin arrest warrant as UK says Moscow likely to expand conscription

US president says international criminal court’s warrant ‘makes a very strong point’ while Moscow rejects move as ‘meaningless’

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2023/mar/18/russia-ukraine-war-live-xxxxx

 

2h ago

07.37 GMT

The international criminal court’s decision to issue an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin obligates the court’s 123 member states to arrest the Russian president and transfer him to The Hague, Netherlands, for trial if he sets foot on their territory.

 

The court also issued a warrant on Friday for Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s commissioner for children’s rights, on the same charges alleging war crimes.

 

Agence France-Presse also reported that a US-backed report by Yale University researchers last month said Russia had held at least 6,000 Ukrainian children in at least 43 camps and other facilities as part of a “large-scale systematic network”.

 

Russia has denied its forces have committed atrocities during the war, while the Kremlin said the arrest warrant against Putin was outrageous and “null and void” for Russia.

 

ICC sources said they thought it was now “very unlikely” Putin would travel to any country currently supporting Ukraine, and that if he did so he risked arrest.

 

2h ago

07.14 GMT

Biden says Putin arrest warrant 'justified'

Joe Biden has said Vladimir Putin clearly committed war crimes and that the international criminal court’s decision to issue an arrest warrant for the Russian leader makes a “very strong point”.

 

“Well, I think it’s justified,” the US president said on Friday of the warrant.

 

But the question is – it’s not recognised internationally by us either. But I think it makes a very strong point.

 

The US is not a member of the international criminal court (ICC) and the Pentagon has resisted cooperating with it out of fears American soldiers could potentially be pursued by the court.

 

The ICC decision, over allegations Putin has overseen the abduction of Ukrainian children, marks the first time the court has issued a warrant against one of the five permanent members of the UN security council.

 

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, hailed the court’s move, saying on social media it was “a historic decision from which historic responsibility will begin”.