Hungary said on Thursday that it would withdraw from the International Criminal Court, announcing that its decision only a few hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel arrived there for an international arrest warrant.
The government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban had clearly indicated that he would ignore his obligations to act on the mandate of the ICC as a party to a 1998 treaty which established the court.
Instead of arresting Netanyahu when he arrived in Budapest early Thursday, Hungary deployed the red carpet, welcoming the Israeli chief of Buda castle overlooking the Danube river with a military honor group.
In a message on Facebook, Gergely Gulyas, Mr. Orban’s chief of staff, said that Hungary would begin the withdrawal process on Thursday “in accordance with managers of constitutional and international law”.
A spokesman for the court, Fadi El Abdallah, refused to comment on the announcement.
Hungary would be the first EU country to withdraw from the court. But a withdrawal would not take effect for a year, because a country must give a one -year opinion to withdraw from the Treaty of Rome on which the court is based.
The International Criminal Court published arrest mandates in November for Mr. Netanyahu and his former Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, accusing them of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip.
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