Putin challenges international warrant for his arrest with visit to Mongolia

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00:00Vladimir Putin given the red carpet treatment in Ulaanbaatar.

00:04By touching down in Mongolia, the Russian president is theoretically running the risk

00:08of arrest, given that his host, a member of the International Criminal Court, is obliged

00:13to detain him.

00:14But the likelihood of that happening is low, despite pressure from Western governments

00:18and human rights groups, and the Kremlin is not worried.

00:22No, there are no concerns.

00:27We have a wonderful dialogue with our friends from Mongolia.

00:30Of course, all aspects of the visit were carefully prepared.

00:36Vladimir Putin's movements have been severely curtailed since the 17th of March last year,

00:41when the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for him.

00:45The prosecutors accused him of the war crime of illegally deporting more than 16,000 Ukrainian

00:50children.

00:51One of Putin's high-profile opposition critics said Mongolia had failed in its obligations

00:57in not arresting the president.

01:00If Mongolia considers itself a country with the rule of law that aspires to be part of

01:04the civilized world, it should respect the Rome Statute that we know it has signed and

01:09ratified.

01:10Mongolia, a former Soviet satellite state, continues to plot a careful course, sandwiched

01:17as it is between two authoritarian giants, Russia and China.

01:21It relies on Moscow for fuel and for one-fifth of its electricity, both of which are indispensable

01:26in one of the world's coldest countries.

01:28Ulan Bator has in recent years turned to Western countries to reduce this dependency, but by

01:34visiting at this time Vladimir Putin is reminding Mongolia it is not yet out of Moscow's sphere

01:40of influence.

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