On Saturday, Chatjaturjan signed the Armenian parliament’s ratification of the so-called Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding document. Parliament voted to join in early October, against Russian protests.
Armenia has previously had Russia as an ally, but Saturday’s announcement means that Armenian authorities fall under the jurisdiction of the ICC and are bound to arrest and extradite President Vladimir Putin to The Hague if he sets foot in the country.
The ICC’s arrest warrant against Vladimir Putin has to do with mass transfers and forced adoptions of Ukrainian children to Russia, for which Putin is described by the ICC as being most responsible. Since then, Putin has not visited any of the over one hundred member states of the ICC.
According to Khajaturjan’s presidential office, the decision should apply retroactively and give the ICC the opportunity to investigate suspected war crimes in connection with Azerbaijan’s crushing of the ethnic Armenian self-government in the disputed breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh earlier this year.