Vladimir Putin's visit to Mongolia has dealt a blow to the entire system of international criminal law. But there is no need to make a tragedy out of it, and the consequences of the decision will be felt by Mongolia, which has put its international subjectivity at risk. Putin used the whole country as a tool of geopolitical game, said Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin during a discussion within the New Country project “Punishing evil: the Rome Statute and the restart of international law".
There are 125 ratifiers of the Rome Statute, and among them there are those who cannot do anything if the Russian leader wants to go there. Kostin believes that Putin's choice of Mongolia was deliberate - it is "an ordinary country with an ordinary level of democracy".
"There will definitely be a reaction. I understand that there are concerns that Putin may go to Brazil for the G20 this year. But this does not mean that it will be that easy. There are other members of the G20, and I don't think all of them will be happy to see Putin in Brazil or in any other country. I don't think this case undermines the credibility of the mechanism, but it does show that the system of international law itself is under constant threat. Putin has actually shown that the system of international law can be disregarded," said the Ukrainian Prosecutor General.
Kostin is convinced that this does not mean that we should reject all the achievements of mankind in international law since the Second World War. Instead, it means that Ukraine needs to become a full-fledged part of this system.
- In early September, Russian leader Vladimir Putin travelled to Mongolia, a state party to the Rome Statute, which is supposed to arrest him under an International Criminal Court warrant issued for the abduction of Ukrainian children.
- According to Bloomberg, Mongolia assured Putin that he was in no danger.
- Ukrainian MPs asked Mongolia to hand Putin over to the ICC.