Viacheslav Volodin announced a ban on the activities of the ICC in Russia

The State Duma is preparing amendments to legislation that will ban the activities of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and international bodies in Russia directed against the Russian Federation and its citizens, said Vyacheslav Volodin, chairman of the lower house, following a meeting on April 3.

According to the speaker, the relevant committees of the State Duma are preparing appropriate amendments to the federal law “On Security”. In addition, we are talking about the introduction of a ban on public appeals for the execution of decisions of the ICC. It is also proposed to give the president the authority to protect citizens of the Russian Federation in the event that international bodies make decisions that contradict Russian law, the press service of the State Duma notes.

It is necessary to provide for criminal liability for such crimes, Volodin emphasized. “For this purpose, proposals are being prepared to introduce norms for punishment in the form of fines and imprisonment into the Criminal and Criminal Procedure Codes,” he said.

The meeting with Volodin was attended by Deputy Speaker of the State Duma Irina Yarovaya and chairmen of relevant committees – on security and anti-corruption Vasily Piskarev and on defense Andrey Kartapolov.

The ICC is a “quasi-judicial corrupt structure without legal foundations,” said Andrei Klishas, ​​chairman of the Federation Council committee on constitutional legislation and state building. Reacting legislatively to the ICC’s PR campaigns is “an empty and senseless undertaking,” he believes. “But when Russian organizations, banks, for example, on the basis of Western sanctions, refused to work with sub-sanctioned organizations and individuals, when these individuals were asked to close their accounts, when many refused to work in Crimea because of sanctions, there should be criminal liability for this, for actions to enforce Western sanctions on the territory of our country,” Klishas wrote in his Telegram channel.

If the amendments are adopted, the activities of the ICC will be declared a threat to the security of citizens of the Russian Federation, Sergey Glandin, a partner at the NSP law firm and an expert in international law, told Vedomosti. Accordingly, the acts and decisions of this international judicial institution will not be recognized in Russia and executed, the expert says. But it’s more difficult to say what other “international bodies” he’s talking about, he argues.

Based on Russia’s commitment to obligations under international law, we will definitely not talk about the institutions and bodies of the UN system. It is likely that international bodies should be understood as the G7 or a coalition that applies a cap price on Russian oil, Glandin said. According to the expert, there were precedents of laws directed against the ICC in the world, but they did not mention “other” organizations either. Sudan took action to de-recognise the ICC following arrest warrants for their leader. The ICC was also opposed by the administration of US President Donald Trump – suffice it to recall the whole program of sanctions in June 2021, under which prosecutor Fatou Bensouda fell in September of the same year, recalls Glandin.

On March 17, the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, Commissioner for Children’s Rights in the Russian Federation. Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said then that the decisions of this court have no legal force and are void. And Deputy Chairman of the Security Council Dmitry Medvedev stressed that “practical value [в этом ордере нет] no”. The Russian Investigative Committee opened a criminal case against ICC prosecutor Karim Ahmad Khan, ICC judges Tomoko Akane, Rosario Salvatore Aytala and Sergio Gerardo Ugalde Godinez.