BRICS Summit: Vladimir Putin Opts for Virtual Presence to avoid arrests in south Africa

Russian President Vladimir Putin will not be making the trip to this year’s BRICS summit in South Africa, becoming the first leader to essentially participate virtually while others go in person. A mutual agreement was cited in a statement released by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa. Rather than Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov going to represent his country at that summit.

It is a significant setback for Putin, who has frequently highlighted his links with BRIC nations —BRICS— India, China, Brazil and South Africa to counter efforts by the United States and Europe isolating Russia over its actions in Ukraine.

The International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin earlier this year, accusing him of war crimes related to the deportation of Ukrainian children. So there are worries that he might be arrested if he left Russian soil.

As a signatory to the Rome Statute that set up the ICC, South Africa is bound by decisions of the court. Still, it garnered international criticism in 2015 after refusing to execute an ICC arrest warrant against then-Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir during the African Summit.

Furthermore, the South Africa main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, has applied for a court order to arrest Putin should he land in Cape Town for the BRICS summit.

After a series of consultations, the decision for Putin to participate virtually in the summit was reached, as revealed by South African President’s spokesman Vincent Magwenya.