Foreign and domestic problems for Russia after the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant, for Vladimir Putin.

The Russian President and his Commissioner for Child Rights are accused of unlawfully deporting children from Ukraine to Russia.

Otago University International Relations professor Robert Patman says the ruling will change the way foreign leaders deal with Putin.

He says it'll also make those in his inner circle nervous.

"This will probably increase the view within Russia that Mr Putin has become a political liability. After all, Russia now is for all intents and purposes in legal terms, a pariah state." 

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