Russian ex-president threatens missile strike against The Hague after Putin arrest warrant

Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council, on March 20 threatened a missile strike against the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands after it issued an arrest warrant for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.

"Everyone walks under God and missiles. It's quite possible to envision a scenario where a Russian ship stationed in the North Sea could strategically strike the Hague courthouse with a hypersonic Onyx (cruise) missile," Medvedev, who is also a former Russian president, wrote.

He went on to warn judges of the International Criminal Court to "look carefully at the sky."

Medvedev also used foul language to criticize the court, calling it "shitty" and saying that it "has shat itself."

Margarita Simonyan, chief editor of the Kremlin's English-language propaganda TV channel RT, also hinted earlier that Russia could strike a country that arrests Putin with missiles.

"I'd like to see a country that will arrest Putin to enforce the Hague court's decision," she wrote. "In about eight minutes. Or whatever the time it takes (a missile) to fly to its capital."

The International Criminal Court (ICC), which is located in the Hague, issued arrest warrants on March 17 for Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, the Russian official overseeing the forced deportations of more than 16,000 Ukrainian children to Russia.

The ICC asserts that there are "reasonable grounds to believe" Putin holds direct accountability for supervising the deportations and that he neglected to exert authority over Russian soldiers and civilians executing the crime across occupied Ukrainian regions from the onset of Russia's all-out war against Ukraine.

Russia is not a party to the ICC treaty, having withdrawn in 2016 following its criticism of the illegal annexation of Crimea. This means that Putin can only be arrested in one of the 123 countries that follow it.

However, as President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged on March 19, the arrest warrant signaled a "turning point" for Russia.

“(Russia will face) responsibility for every strike on Ukraine, for every destroyed life, for every deported Ukrainian child,” Zelensky said. “The evil state will be held accountable for every act of terror against Ukrainians," he added.

BREAKING: ICC issues arrest warrants for Putin, Russian official tied to kidnapping of Ukrainian children

The Kyiv Independent