Russian Official Threatens To Strike ICC, The Hague Over Putin's Arrest Warrant

A top Kremlin official on Monday said Russia should strike the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague after it issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin over the unlawful deportation of Ukrainian children.

In a lengthy Telegram post, Russian Security Council Deputy Chair and former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev suggested the use of hypersonic missiles to target The Hague.

"The ICC judges got all worked up in vain. 'Look,' they said, 'we're brave, we're not too chickensh*t to raise a hand against the largest nuclear power.' Alas, gentlemen, everyone walks under God and rockets. It's not hard to imagine the targeted use of a hypersonic 'Onyx' from the North Sea from a Russian ship on the Hague courthouse," he said, as translated by Meduza.

Medvedev also mocked the ICC, suggesting that NATO would unlikely retaliate should a strike happen as the court is "only a miserable international organization, not the population of a NATO country."

Medvedev ended the post by advising the ICC's judges to "look carefully into the sky."

The Telegram post comes days after the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Putin for his role in the forced transfer and adoption of Ukrainian children amid the war. The ICC also issued an arrest warrant for Russian children's rights commissioner Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova.

Medvedev is not the only Russian official who has responded to the ICC's arrest warrant. On Monday, Russia's top investigative body announced it had opened a "criminal" case against the prosecutors and judges of the ICC, including prosecutor Karim Ahmad Khan and judges Tomoko Akane, Rosario Salvatore Aitala and Sergio Gerardo Ugalde Godínez.

The state investigative body argued there were no grounds for criminal liability on Putin's part and that heads of state had immunity under a 1973 U.N. convention. The investigative committee also accused the ICC of committing "signs of crimes" under Russian law, including knowingly accusing an innocent person of a crime.

The prosecutor and judges of the ICC were also suspected of "preparing an attack on a representative of a foreign state enjoying international protection, in order to complicate international relations."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last week said authorities have recorded more than 16,000 cases of forced deportation of Ukrainian children. However, he warned that the actual figures are likely much higher.