Vladimir Putin must be tried in an international court for ordering the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. He must be tried, not just indicted, and to do this a new international court explicitly intended to deal with leaders responsible for such territorial aggression must be created. Since the Russian president won’t appear before any international court, he will need to be tried in absentia. Nevertheless, such a trial is essential not only to uphold international law, but to deter other international leaders who are contemplating aggression.

This is Geoffrey Robertson’s argument in his new book, The Trial of Vladimir Putin. The book has several strands: a discussion of how the veto power of the five permanent members (P5) of the UN Security Council (UNSC) has circumscribed the expansion of an international jurisdiction; a history of how, despite this, such a jurisdiction has haltingly evolved; and a description of the type of new court that Robertson says is needed to try Putin. He goes on to describe a hypothetical trial of the Russian dictator in such a court, and outlines the sort of arguments both the prosecution and the defence would mount.