ICC Refuses To Annul Putin's Arrest Warrant
- 6.12.2025, 15:11
Even if amnesty is spelled out in the peace treaty.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) warrants for the arrest of Putin and five other high-ranking Russian officials accused of war crimes in Ukraine will remain in force even if a general amnesty, a clause of which was contained in Washington's draft peace treaty on Ukraine, is declared. About this, reported in the ICC. A separate UN Security Council resolution would be required to suspend the warrants issued by the court, it said, according to The Moscow Times.
"If a peace agreement is reached that then allows the Security Council to ask us to postpone the investigation, then it is ... a matter of political process for the Security Council. But as far as we are concerned ... ultimately it will not prevent justice from being done," ICC Deputy Prosecutor Najat Shamim Khan said Friday, citing the Rome Statute, which is fundamental to the organization.
In 2023, the ICC issued an arrest warrant against Putin for a number of international crimes, including the alleged deportation and abduction of children from occupied territories in Ukraine. Along with the president, the arrest warrant was issued for Russia's children's ombudsman Maria Lvova-Belova. Also wanted by the ICC were former Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and the head of the Russian Armed Forces General Staff Valery Gerasimov, who are suspected of alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.
According to another deputy prosecutor, Mame Mandiae Nyanga, in addition to the mentioned provision on the order of the Security Council, "we are bound by our charter, which does not take into account some of these political arrangements."
In November, media outlets published the first version of a 28-point U.S. peace proposal. One point of the plan stipulated that "all parties involved in the conflict would receive full amnesty for their actions during the war." Last week, however, ABC News sources reported that the U.S. had excluded a clause on amnesty for Russian Federation for war crimes from the shortened U.S. peace draft, which was reworked during negotiations with the Ukrainian delegation in Geneva.