Putin's Mongolia trip and Kyiv's call for arrest

Would a member state of the International Criminal Court detain a sitting head of state wanted by that court? That question hung over Ulaanbaatar on 2 September 2024, when Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Mongolia.

According to reports at the time, Putin came to discuss a China–Russia gas pipeline, intended to help Russia recoup losses caused by Western sanctions. The trip was his first visit to an ICC member state since the court issued its arrest warrant for him.

Kyiv's appeal

On 30 August 2024, as Putin travelled towards Ulaanbaatar, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged Mongolia to arrest him. Ukraine and the European Union both pressed Mongolia to act on the warrant. Despite those calls, Putin arrived as planned on 2 September.

A week of pressure from several sides

The visit came at the end of a week in which Kyiv's attention was divided between diplomacy and the war. On 27 August, Zelenskyy announced that Ukraine had successfully tested a domestically produced ballistic missile for the first time. The same day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned the United States and other NATO members against allowing Ukraine to use long-range missiles to strike targets in Russia.

Zelenskyy also said on 27 August that Poland would cooperate with Ukraine to return Ukrainians who had crossed the border illegally to evade conscription, a group he described as including people who had violated the law, traitors and collaborators.

On 30 August, Zelenskyy dismissed the Air Force commander, Mykola Oleshchuk, after an F-16 fighter jet crashed and its pilot died while defending against Russian strikes.

What the day showed

The arrival in Mongolia set two pieces of the story side by side: an ICC warrant that Ukraine and the EU wanted enforced, and a Russian economic push around a gas pipeline to offset sanctions. Kyiv had made its position public before Putin landed, and the visit went ahead regardless.