Warrants, a court case and 1,205 children
Published 6 October 2026
On 17 March 2023, the International Criminal Court announced arrest warrants for Putin and presidential children's-rights commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova. The allegations concerned the war crimes of unlawful deportation and unlawful transfer of children from occupied Ukrainian areas to Russia, allegedly committed from at least 24 February 2022. The court said there were reasonable grounds to believe each bore responsibility. For Putin, the announcement referred to acts committed directly, jointly or through others, and to alleged failure to exercise proper control over civilian and military subordinates. The warrant is a judicial decision at the inquiry stage, not a conviction after trial. Its seriousness does not depend on erasing that procedural distinction. (ICC, warrant announcement, 17 March 2023)
The ICC said the warrants were secret to protect victims and witnesses and safeguard the case, but that public disclosure of their existence, suspects and alleged crimes could help prevent further offences. This explains the difference between a public press announcement and a fully open evidentiary file. The announcement states the threshold the judges applied and the public information they authorised, while preserving the protected contents. (ICC, 17 March 2023 announcement, public-disclosure explanation)
The legal record expanded on 5 March 2024 with warrants for long-range aviation commander Sergei Kobylash and Black Sea Fleet commander Viktor Sokolov. The alleged conduct concerned missile attacks on Ukrainian electric infrastructure from at least 10 October 2022 to at least 9 March 2023. Judges cited the war crimes of attacking civilian objects and causing excessive incidental civilian harm, together with the crime against humanity of other inhumane acts. The alleged modes of responsibility included acting through others, ordering crimes and failing to control forces under command. This brought the campaign against electricity infrastructure into the ICC's public case narrative through named commanders and specified legal categories, not through a general declaration that every strike on an energy site was automatically a war crime. (ICC, warrant announcement, 5 March 2024)
The distinction in the judges' reasoning was important. They found reasonable grounds to believe strikes were directed at civilian objects and that, for installations that might have been military objectives at the relevant time, expected civilian harm would have been clearly excessive relative to the anticipated military advantage. The assessment therefore addressed both distinction and proportionality. It did not rely on the claim that an electrical installation can never have military significance. The court also considered the alleged campaign a course of conduct against a civilian population pursuant to state policy. (ICC, 5 March 2024 announcement, reasoning on targets and civilian harm)
The court issued further warrants on 24 June 2024 for former defence minister Sergei Shoigu and chief of staff Valery Gerasimov, announced on 25 June. Again the alleged campaign concerned electric infrastructure between 10 October 2022 and 9 March 2023. The court cited attacks on civilian objects, excessive incidental harm and other inhumane acts. Its statement said factual allegations were supported sufficiently to meet the statutory requirements for issuing warrants. Reporting them as 25 June "convictions", or assigning them a later campaign not covered by the statement, would misdescribe both timing and procedure. (ICC, Shoigu/Gerasimov announcement, 25 June 2024, warrants issued 24 June)
The ICJ is a different court with a different kind of case. Ukraine's proceeding under the Genocide Convention concerned Russia's claim that it invaded to stop genocide in eastern Ukraine. On 16 March 2022, the ICJ ordered Russia to suspend the military operations it had begun on 24 February, in a 13-2 decision reported by Reuters. That was an order for provisional measures in a dispute between states, not a warrant for an individual's arrest. The ICC proceedings concern individual criminal responsibility; the ICJ proceeding concerns obligations and disputes within its jurisdiction. Keeping the two institutions separate prevents their decisions from being assembled into a misleading single criminal verdict against the Russian state or leadership. ICJ, provisional-measures record, 16 March 2022; Reuters, order coverage, 16 March 2022.
The ICJ's 2 February 2024 jurisdiction ruling narrowed what could proceed. The court accepted jurisdiction over Ukraine's request for a declaration that it had not breached the Genocide Convention, while rejecting the request to determine whether Russia's invasion itself violated that convention. Reuters said judges would later address whether Ukraine committed genocide in the specified eastern areas; the jurisdiction decision did not decide that merits question. This limitation is central, not an embarrassing detail to omit. A court's refusal to hear a particular claim under one treaty is not an endorsement of an invasion, and its agreement to hear another claim is not yet the final judgment on that claim. ICJ, 2 February 2024 jurisdiction announcement; Reuters, 2 February 2024.
By March 2026, the UN Commission of Inquiry had verified deportation or transfer of 1,205 children from five Ukrainian regions. Its advance report to the Human Rights Council identified these as documented cases, including cases previously reported, not an estimate of every child taken during the war. The commission concluded that the conduct amounted to crimes against humanity as well as war crimes. The 12 March release rounded the verified number to "over 1,200" and said 80 percent of children in the documented cases had not been returned four years later. Neither 1,205 nor 80 percent can safely be extrapolated to all missing Ukrainian children. Their evidentiary value comes from a defined set of cases, a named lead examiner and a specified reporting date. Commission report, A/HRC/61/61, March 2026; OHCHR release, 12 March 2026.
The commission's finding addressed a system rather than just transportation. It said Russian authorities coordinated legal, administrative and practical measures to move children and place them with families or institutions in 21 Russian regions and occupied Ukrainian areas. Authorities granted citizenship and put children's profiles on adoption databases while failing systematically to disclose their whereabouts to families or guardians. The commission said the policy had been conceived and executed at the highest level, with Putin and Lvova-Belova visibly involved from the outset. This is the commission's attribution, distinct from the ICC's separate proceedings. (OHCHR, Commission of Inquiry release, 12 March 2026)
The return problem was itself part of the legal finding. The commission said children and caregivers had largely been left to locate one another, facing delays, obstacles and security risks. It found that the absence of a repatriation system and the prolonged separation violated obligations to facilitate family reunion and amounted to the war crime of unjustifiable delay in repatriation. The report also described enforced disappearance: removal without disclosure of whereabouts, coercive conditions and indefinite placements obstructing return. Commission chair Erik Møse said children should never be separated from families coercively. The legal account therefore goes beyond the date of removal to the continuing conditions that prevent families from recovering their children. Commission report, A/HRC/61/61, paragraphs 15-17; 12 March 2026 release.
A later EU sanctions decision would make that concern explicit. On Monday, 28 September 2026, the Council listed another 10 individuals and 17 entities over actions involving Ukrainian children. Its statement estimated that more than 20,500 children had been deported and forcibly transferred since the start of Russia's war of aggression. That is the Council's estimate. It is not a judicially established total or a count of children still unlocated after accounting for returns. (EU Council)
The issue also complicates any promise that a ceasefire will end the war's consequences. Fighting could stop while families remain separated. Territorial arrangements could leave custodial decisions and documents unresolved. The 2025 Jeddah statement included the return of forcibly transferred Ukrainian children among humanitarian concerns associated with the peace process. The silence of artillery is therefore an important condition, not a complete definition of recovery. (Reuters)
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