The International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova.

In a press release today the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued arrest warrants for Vladimir Putin and his children’s rights commissioner Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, for the “unlawful deportation” of Ukrainian children.

The court’s pre-trial judges assessed there were reasonable grounds to believe that each suspect bears responsibility for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population and that of unlawful transfer of population from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation, in prejudice of Ukrainian children.

The judges considered issuing secret warrants but decided that making them public could contribute to the prevention of the further commission of crimes.