Statement by Ambassador, Permanent Representative of Ukraine at the UN Sergíy Kyslytsya at the Security Council meeting on “Maintenance of peace and security of Ukraine”

Statement by Ambassador, Permanent Representative of Ukraine at the UN Sergíy Kyslytsya at the Security Council meeting on “Maintenance of peace and security of Ukraine” (11 April 2024)

"Madam President, distinguished members of the Security Council, Assistant Secretary-General Jenča and Director Wosornu, I also recognize here junior russian staff in the permanent seat of the Soviet Union. Apparently the big boys have already run away. His country has finally abandoned attempts to invent plausible explanations for its aggression. Instead, it now openly declares the true goals of the war: the complete annihilation of the Ukrainian state, Ukrainian people, and Ukrainian identity. Indeed, it was difficult even for Russian propaganda to explain how the destruction of Ukrainian cities and the mass murder of Ukrainians could be considered "liberation of a brotherly nation." It was difficult to repeat the false mantra about "bombing Donbas for eight years" as a pretext for war against the backdrop of the Russian army persistently wiping out more and more Donbas cities and villages for over two years. Furthermore, it was extremely difficult to pretend that Russia fights against neo-Nazism while replicating all the behavioral patterns typical of the Nazi Reich. Now, Moscow seems to align its words with its deeds. They openly call for the killing of all Ukrainians and the elimination of the Ukrainian state, as we can see from recent policy documents, statements from Russian officials, and top propagandists. Putin’s close accomplice, former president Medvedev, for instance, calls in his Telegram channel, “to chop up Bandera pigs”, meaning all Ukrainians. Medvedev’s Nazi predecessors, as we know, labelled Ukrainians and other Slavic peoples as “Untermenschen”. Actually, it seems that even the Shazam app on your smartphones may face trouble in identifying who one or another quote belongs to, Nazi criminals or their Kremlin followers. Nazi propagandist Goebbels used to say: “We will strike until destruction. The Fuhrer intends to wipe cities like Moscow or Petersburg off the face of the earth. And it is indeed necessary.” Now how about this quote? “Kharkiv must be wiped off the face of the Earth, just so that there are no illusions. But we need to start with Kyiv, we just need to destroy all… Completely wipe it off so that nothing remains, just radioactive dust.” It’s Russian propagandist Solovyov who echoed Goebbels on Russian state TV. Another one. “We know that we are dealing in the East with an infernal political Satanism.” Goebbels said. And his echo today, let me quote. “Special military operation is a Holy War, in which Russia and its people … protect the world from … the victory of the West, which has succumbed to Satanism.” It is a quote from the so-called Order of the XXV World Russian People’s Council “The present and future of the Russian World”. It is baffling that this structure, led by the head of the Russian orthodox church, has a special consultative status with the ECOSOC. What a disgrace for the UN to have such a “consultant”! In general, it often seems that Russian officials and propagandists use the Goebbels’ diary as their textbook. The latter, for example, wrote in February 1943 that “the National Socialist government is ready to use every means. We do not care if anyone objects.” Putin’s Minister Lavrov in January 2024 responded in the same way to the question about the overwhelming majority of the UN Member States condemning Russia’s invasion as a violation of the UN Charter. “It doesn’t matter to us who and how voted.” Madam President, Implementing its annihilation strategy, Russia has fired nearly 1,000 missiles, about 2,800 "Shahed" drones and almost 7,000 guided aerial bombs on Ukrainian cities and villages since the beginning of the year. The total explosive power of combined air strikes on Ukraine for this period exceeds 9 kilotons. Only 3% of Russian missiles, drones and guided bombs hit military targets, while 97% hit civilian infrastructure. Russia deliberately targeted the critical energy infrastructure, in particular power generation. Following the March attacks, 80 per cent of thermal power generation was destroyed. Hydropower plants also sustained heavy damage. In particular, Russia targeted the Dniester HPP and the Kaniv HPP 29 March, indicating its intention to replicate the catastrophe they caused in Kakhovka last June. It should be a common task of the international community, not only Ukraine, to ensure that such large-scale environmental disasters no longer occur in Europe. Kharkiv – the second largest city in Ukraine before the war – has become a particular target for the Russian forces. Russian state-affiliated expert Aleksandr Sytin, who is the Head of the so-called “Center for Political Studies of Northern and Eastern European Countries” openly admitted on a Russian federal TV channel that “the capture or destruction of Kharkiv will have a painful, demoralizing effect on Ukrainian society. But I believe that the will of this people needs to be broken over the knee.” That’s why Russia shells Kharkiv’s civilian infrastructure on an almost daily basis with rockets, drones and aerial guided bombs. Almost all critical energy infrastructure in the region, including the Zmiiv Thermal Power Plant, was destroyed. Overnight Russia again attacked our critical infrastructure. The Trypillya Thermal Power Plant – the main supplier of energy in Kyiv, Cherkasy and Zhytomyr regions – was completely destroyed. It is practically impossible to make the final update of my statement as Russian shellings continue even now, during the Council’s meeting. To increase the scope of casualties the Russian army resorts to the terrorist practice of double strikes, attacking the site of the first attack with new wave of missiles or drones when the rescue operation is underway. Among the most recent examples is the Russian attack against Kharkiv on April 4th. The first wave of drones hit multi-story residential buildings. As soon as first responders came on site, Russia attacked again. As a result of this attack four people were killed, including three firefighters, who rescued people from a destroyed building. This terrorist practice of deliberate heavy strikes against a city with a population of more than million could result in thousands of civilian deaths. Overall, such tactics are employed everywhere, from the border territories in the north to the Donbas and the south of Ukraine. After destruction of Avdiivka, Russia is now leveling the next city to the ground - Chasiv Yar. Odesa, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Mykolayiv, Sumy, Khmelnytskyi, Lviv and other regions also remain under constant attacks. The UN in Ukraine confirms the inhumane Russian tactics towards Ukrainian civilians. As follows from its March Update on Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine verified that at least 604 civilians were killed or injured in Ukraine last month, a 20 per cent increase compared to February. The Mission was clear in its assessments that the March increase in civilian casualties was mainly due to attacks by the Russian armed forces using missiles and loitering munitions across Ukraine and increased aerial bombardments near the frontline. The rise of child casualties is even more disastrous as their number doubled from February. Fifty-seven Ukrainian children were killed or injured in March, as a result, according to the UN Mission, of the increased use of guided and unguided aerial bombs. The casualty toll among civilians, including children, continues to rapidly grow. Just yesterday Russian forces bombed the village of Lyptsi, Kharkiv region, killing 3 people, including a 14-year-old girl. Missile shelling of Odesa region took the lives of four people, including a 10-year-old girl. The day before, they hit a residential building in Kostyantynivka, Donetsk region. Three people were killed, including a 13-year-old boy. Madam President, We remain concerned over the atrocities towards Ukrainian POWs. On April 7th, shocking new video footage appeared on Russian social media, showing Russian military personnel killing three captured unarmed Ukrainian servicemen in the Kherson region. In its latest report covering the period from December 1, 2023, to February 29, 2024, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights documented a sharp increase in reports of executions of Ukrainian prisoners of war, reaching the number of 32 such executions, significantly more than in any previous period. Overall, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies are investigating 27 criminal cases regarding the execution of 54 Ukrainian prisoners of war by Russians since the beginning of Russia's large-scale invasion of Ukraine. This relentless wave of violence against Ukrainian POWs is substantiated by numerous credible sources, including reports verified by the United Nations. The findings of the International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine confirm a consistent pattern of widespread and systematic torture carried out by Russian authorities in detention facilities. Furthermore, the refusal of Russia to grant access to POWs and civilian detainees to representatives of the UN and ICRC only adds to the urgency of the situation. We urge the members of the Security Council to prioritize this issue and contribute to determining the most effective strategies to address and put an end to these blatant violations of international humanitarian law. Madam President, Committing war crimes and denying responsibility for them have been a hallmark of Russia since the beginning of its aggression against Ukraine. Some of the most painful memories for Ukrainians are connected with the Bucha massacre. Recently we marked the second anniversary of the liberation of Bucha. This liberation put a stop to the outrageous crimes committed by the Russian forces during the occupation of this city in March 2022. Residents of Bucha and other settlements in the vicinity of Kyiv were indiscriminately shot, illegally detained, tortured and summarily executed. They were deliberately fired at with automatic weapons when leaving buildings for food and water. Households were regularly raided with men often questioned and either killed on the spot or detained and later executed. Ukrainian law enforcement collected more than 9 000 documents on war crimes committed in Bucha and its outskirts. About 1800 civilians were killed. Ukraine identified 146 servicemen of the Russian armed forced as suspects for war crimes committed in Bucha district, indicted 93 and convicted 19 Russian servicemen. The Russian Federation continues to deny killings of civilians in Bucha, including through the Security Council platform. It is a cynical, although regular behavior of criminals denying their crimes. Denying, despite open-source evidence, satellite footage and findings of international mechanisms, including OHCHR, Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine and OSCE Moscow Mechanism, have debunked Russian denials and confirmed that the killings took place weeks before the liberation. Madam President, Even if the Putin and Hitler regimes are not identical twins, they share the same toxic DNA. Eighty years ago, almost a decade spent on appeasement resulted in a world war. The attempts to appease the new aggressor that we observed from 2014 to 2022 resulted in a full-scale war on the European continent. The lessons of history must be learned. If the Security Council had existed during WWII, would its members have sat at the same table with the Ribbentrops while the Nazis were destroying European cities and sending thousands of people to gas chambers? And yet we now sit with modern reincarnations of the Ribbentrops. And we will again sit tomorrow at a propaganda show and we will listen to new allegations against the country that defends itself and its people from elimination. And the Russian government and the Russian church will continue to declare through its GONGO, mentioned earlier, that [I quote] “the entire territory of modern Ukraine should enter the zone of exclusive influence of Russia.” We don’t need this mockery of diplomacy. What we need is solidarity with Ukraine in exercising its inherent right to self-defense under the Article 51 of the UN Charter, zero-tolerance towards Russian crimes, and a vision of peace, based on the UN Charter. The vision endorsed by the UNGA Resolution of 23 February 2023 and developed within Ukraine’s Peace Formula. The first Peace Summit will take place on 15-16 June in Switzerland and we invite all responsible nations to participate and to contribute to comprehensive, just and lasting peace for Ukraine and for the world. I thank you."

Credit UN Photo/Loey Felipe