Russia withdraws support for 'biased' International Criminal Court

Russia has withdrawn its 16-year-old signature from a document that founded the International Criminal Court.

The move, which came at the order of President Vladimir Putin, was made amid claims the ICC had unfairly accused Russian forces involved in a brief 2008 war with Georgia.

A statement from the Russian Foreign Ministry accused the ICC of failing to become a "genuinely independent authoritative organ on international justice".

The order said that Russia was retracting its decision to sign the ICC's founding treaty - something it did in 2000.

However, the move was merely symbolic as Russia had not actually ratified the treaty in the first place, meaning it was not subject to the ICC's jurisdiction.

Russia's departure from the ICC is not the first in recent weeks.

It follows a similar path taken by Gambia, South Africa and Burundi amid similar accusations of "injustice" and bias.

In addition to the investigation into the 2008 Georgia war, a report on Monday issued by the ICC further angered Moscow by referring to Russia's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimea as an armed conflict.

"Unfortunately, the court has not justified the hopes attached to it and has not become a genuinely independent authoritative organ of international justice," the Foreign Ministry said.

"It is revealing that in its 14 years of work the ICC has pronounced just four verdicts and spent over $1 billion".

The ICC, based in The Hague, Netherlands, was founded when 120 countries adopted the Rome Statute, its founding treaty, in 1998.