TOP HEADLINES

• Some 10,000 Ukrainian civilians, many elderly and with disabilities, are clinging on to existence in horrific circumstances in and around the besieged city of Bakhmut, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Friday.

• Russia wants to create demilitarized buffer zones inside Ukraine around areas it has annexed, an ally of President Vladimir Putin said on Friday, saying it might be necessary to push deeper into Ukraine if such zones cannot be set up.

• Russia's parliament speaker on Saturday proposed banning the activities of the International Criminal Court after it issued an arrest warrant earlier this month for President Vladimir Putin, accusing him of the war crimes.

• Air force commanders from Sweden, Norway, Finland and Denmark said on Friday they have signed a letter of intent to create a unified Nordic air defence aimed at countering the rising threat from Russia.

• Russia's middle class will shrink as social inequality grows over coming years, an economic study conducted by Russian experts suggested, as sanctions against Moscow and limited growth potential scupper development prospects.

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Russia wants to ban ICC

Russia's parliament speaker on Saturday proposed banning the activities of the International Criminal Court (ICC) after the court issued an arrest warrant for President Vladimir Putin, accusing him of war crimes.

Vyacheslav Volodin, an ally of Putin, said that Russian legislation should be amended to prohibit any activity of the ICC in Russia and to punish any who gave "assistance and support" to the ICC.

"It is necessary to work out amendments to legislation prohibiting any activity of the ICC on the territory of our country," Volodin said in a Telegram post.

Volodin said that the United States had legislated to prevent its citizens ever being tried by the Hague court and that Russia should continue that work.

Any assistance or support for the ICC inside Russia, he said, should be punishable under law.

The ICC issued an arrest warrant earlier this month accusing Putin of the war crime of illegally deporting hundreds of children from Ukraine. It said there are reasonable grounds to believe that Putin bears individual criminal responsibility.

Russian officials have cautioned that any attempt to arrest Putin, Russia's paramount leader since the last day of 1999, would amount to a declaration of war against the world's largest nuclear power.

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