Fanfare and red carpet: Vladimir Putin was received with great pomp on Tuesday in Mongolia, his first visit to a member country of the International Criminal Court (ICC) since the issuance of an arrest warrant against him.
Arriving Monday evening in the Mongolian capital Ulan Bator, the Russian president was greeted by the guard of honour, without being arrested as he got off the plane.
His trip appears to be an act of defiance towards the ICC, war-torn Ukraine, and several Western countries and human rights organisations that had called for his arrest.
Vladimir Putin was received on Tuesday by his Mongolian counterpart Ukhnaa Khurelsukh at a lavish ceremony held on the imposing Genghis Khan Square in Ulaanbaatar.
A brass band performed military tunes and the Russian and Mongolian national anthems in front of the two leaders, who stood next to Mongolian soldiers in traditional dress.
Alongside Ukhnaa Khurelsukh, Vladimir Putin then praised Mongolia’s “respectful attitude” towards their “common historical heritage” and assured that the two countries had “close positions” on “many current international issues”.
The Russian president has been the target of an arrest warrant since March 2023 for suspicion of illegal deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia. Mongolia, a member of the ICC, was therefore obliged to arrest him.
“Today, Putin humiliated Mongolia by cynically using it as a bargaining chip in his geopolitical game,” Ukrainian Prosecutor General Andrii Kostin responded on X.
“Providing security to a criminal undermines the very essence of the global justice system and seriously violates the values of democratic countries. By refusing to arrest Putin, Mongolia has deliberately undermined its international status,” he said.
For its part, the European Union said it “regretted” that Mongolia had not respected its obligations by executing the arrest warrant, according to a statement.
Washington has been more circumspect, saying it expects Mongolia to “respect its international obligations” while saying it “understands” that the country is “sandwiched between its two big neighbors.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Mongolia in early August to provide US support to this “central” partner.
“Immoral”
The ICC, based in The Hague, Netherlands, had said that its member countries have an “obligation” to arrest individuals targeted by an arrest warrant. But in practice, any possible sanctions are essentially limited to a verbal reprimand.
On the streets of Ulaanbaatar, Altanbayar Altankhuyag, a 26-year-old economist, told AFP it would have been “immoral and inappropriate” to arrest Mr Putin during his visit.
A landlocked democracy between authoritarian Russia and China, Mongolia has maintained close ties with Moscow since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.
A former satellite country of the USSR, it did not condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine and abstained from voting on the conflict at the UN.
The Kremlin assured last week that it had “no concerns” about a possible arrest of the Russian president in Mongolia.
“It is obvious that there was no chance of stopping Mr Putin,” political analyst Bayarlkhagva Munkhnaran told AFP.
“For Ulaanbaatar, the current scandal over the ICC arrest warrant is a secondary issue compared to the need to maintain secure and predictable relations with the Kremlin.”
Protesters arrested
On Monday afternoon, a handful of protesters expressed their discontent in Ulaanbaatar, some holding a banner reading “Get rid of war criminal Putin.”
But police prevented another demonstration on Tuesday.
“We tried to protest against war criminal Putin, but we were illegally detained for five hours,” Tsatsral Bat-Ochir, a member of the NoWar movement, which opposes the Russian invasion of Ukraine, told AFP.
According to a police official, N. Batbayar, protesters were arrested for trying to enter a “security zone” around Vladimir Putin’s route, specifying that “these were not arrests”.
Vladimir Putin’s visit coincides with the 85the anniversary of the victory of the Mongolian and Soviet forces against Japan.
Before his trip, the Russian leader had praised the “promising economic and industrial projects” between the two countries, in an interview with the Mongolian newspaper Unuudur.
Among these projects: the construction of a trans-Mongolia gas pipeline linking China and Russia, he cited.
The Mongolian government has not commented on the possible arrest of the Russian leader.
But a spokesman for the president denied on social media reports that the ICC had sent a letter asking local authorities to execute the arrest warrant during the visit.