Arrest warrant issued for Putin

Originally published at: Arrest warrant issued for Putin | Boing Boing

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Holy fucksocks.

Not that Putin isn’t a criminal; he totally is.

Just…

How can this even be enforced?

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I guess it means he can’t travel anywhere that’s a signatory to the ICC. Which, paradoxically, means he can come to the US, IIRC

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Arrest warrant issued for Putin

vladimir-putin-laugh

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I’m not sure if this make negotiations harder or not. On paper I guess it probably does, but in the real world, perhaps such negotiations are so unlikely as to be effectively impossible anyway?

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Good deal, now do GW Bush and Tony Blair.

I mean, I don’t have a lot of faith that the warrants will be executed, nor that any of them would actually be held accountable, but I still want it.

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I expect Mar a Lago has already sent the invite.

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I mean, what is there really to negotiate anyway? Putin needs to withdraw his troops from Ukraine. Unless he comes to the table with “OK, we’ll leave. Can we just have a cease-fire long enough for my guys to schlep back across the border?” then there’s not much to talk about.

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In some ways its not so much about Putin (although he absolutely needs to be Nuremburged), it’s a statement to the smaller thugs out there that the ICC is still here and will bring people to justice.

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6m ago17.37 GMT

Andrew Roth

The international criminal court’s arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin will probably be portrayed as a point of no return in Russia, where the Kremlin will spin the court’s decision as proof that the west is seeking nothing short of regime change.

While Putin has already been preparing his public for a long war, the arrest warrant will for the first time raise the concrete possibility that Russia’s leaders and other prominent supporters of the war could face justice at The Hague if they ever find themselves under arrest.

While that is unlikely in the near term, Russia will probably use it to raise the stakes of the war domestically and also to argue, when it wants, that any negotiations are just a smokescreen to the ultimate goal of toppling Putin.

“The west is showing that it’s ready to go all the way,” said Vladlen Tatarsky, one of the best-known of Russia’s influential military bloggers. “They’re betting on creating a schism inside Russia that wants to remove Putin.”

But it’s us who are ready to go all the way with our president until victory, whatever that [victory] looks like. Whatever it costs. Because now there is no road back. Remember that.”

3m ago17.41 GMT

Andrew Roth

Russian officials have already begun to portray the ICC’s arrest warrant in a similar way to how sanctions are used in Russia, as an argument that the country is under siege from western powers.

They are once again seeking a “rally-round-the-flag” effect, this time around the Russian president, by encouraging a siege mentality.

“Washington and Brussels have exhausted all possible sanctions and unfriendly actions,” said Vyacheslav Volodin, the chairman of Russia’s State Duma and a prominent hawk. “They have not managed to break the citizens of the Russian Federation or destroy the economy of our country.”

“Washington and Brussels now understand: if there is Putin, there is Russia,” he continued.

So they are attacking him. Putin’s strength is in the support of the people and the consolidation of society around him.

“Any attack on the Russian president we see as aggression against our country,” he said.

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Well, I guess it means he can’t retire to France…

I don’t think there is any mechanism for enforcement as long as he is head of state, even if he goes to another country (for instance, as part of cease fire negotiations) arresting him while on a state visit would be an act of war in itself.

If he were subject to a non-fatal coup, it would be a mechanism for the coup perpetrators to hand him over to someone else, but that doesn’t really seem likely at this point.

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Seems like the least illegal thing he’s ever done.

Would love to see it be his downfall almost as I’d love to see the Story Daniels issue take down Trump.

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Even if this action doesn’t prompt regime change it could still help further isolate Putin from what international allies he still has. Any state or private actor who partners with Putin could risk sanctions of their own for working with a war criminal.

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It might concentrate minds in Russia-friendly fence-sitting countries like India, South Africa and Brazil.

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Looking at the current Rome Statute signatories I believe the effect will be minimal to non-existent.

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US, UK, etc. have been the ones scuppering negotiations since the war began. That certainly won’t change.

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Originally published at: International Criminal Court issues arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin | Boing Boing

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Is Dog the Bounty Hunter still around? Maybe he could go talk Putin into surrendering to the ICC with the power of bear mace and Christian fellowship.

ETA: typo

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