Boot Russia off UN Security Council

The hypocrisy of international diplomacy has no bounds especially when it pertains to Russia.

Information that recently came to light about Russia’s crimes against humanity complements the cruelty of its previous offenses. Taken together they should be enough to eject Moscow from its unworthy permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

At the United Nations, Ukrainian officials continue to detail Russia’s intransigent belligerence and question if Russia deserves to exercise veto power and enjoy permanent membership on the Security Council. Ironically, despite possessing this information, the UN and the international community refuse to take action against outlaw Russia beyond adopting critical resolutions.

In a statement during an open debate at the UN Security Council on May 22 on the protection of civilians in armed conflict, Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Serhiy Kyslytsya described a litany of daily abuses, dangers and human rights violations that civilians in war-torn eastern Ukraine are enduring due to Russia’s invasion.

Kyslytsya decried the global organization’s duplicity when dealing with protecting civilians caught in the midst Russia’s more than four-year war against Ukraine. He said the UN had committed itself to ensuring the safety of civilians in 1999 but, sadly, as this pertains to Ukraine, “Almost two decades passed by and we all still ‘express concern,’ ‘strongly condemn.’ ‘urge, call and underline’ and so on and so forth.”

The Ukrainian official caustically accused the United Nations of perpetuating its own impotence through inaction. Kyslytsya stated: “As long as impunity rules the day, as long as some UN member states, including one well known permanent member, could not care less about implementing decisions of the ICJ, this Council is doomed to go in circles around the issue of protection of civilians – addressing it but never really solving it.

“It is all akin to putting a Band Aid on a badly bleeding open wound – a lot of effort is being applied, lots of Band Aids may be dispensed, but the patient still does not get any better.”

Understandably, in the hallowed halls of the UN Security Council, where Moscow wields significant power, a much-needed resolution calling for mobilizing a global military coalition to subdue Russia that would reestablish regional and global peace, security and stability would not be approved. As a result, Kyslytsya was left to insist on an escalation of international pressure against Russia. He called on all UN member-states – “no matter how big or small, no matter how rich or poor” – to commit to follow established norms of international law. Furthermore, he said, actions of those that choose to ignore laws, such as Russia, must to “be met with the most resolute response from the international community.”

Kyslytsya indicated that in the absence of a “supranational body” to enforce international law, the global community of law-abiding countries has the responsibility of quell transgressors and aggressors that abuse international law and order for their own aggrandizement.

The Russian war against Ukraine in eastern Ukraine has resulted in an incredible humanitarian emergency that rarely appears on front pages of newspapers or leads the nightly news, Kyslytsya said. Nearly 3,000 Ukrainian soldiers killed, 10,000 civilian casualties, 25,000 civilian wounded since February 2014, and countless buildings, homes and schools destroyed.

He also listed the following points:

·         4.4 million people living in the war affected areas;

·         3.4 million people from the Donbas region now require humanitarian assistance and protection;

·         1.5 million registered internally displaced persons;

·         Ukraine has increased by more than 6 times budgetary allocations for monthly cash payouts to the affected people;

·         Bureaucratic red tape has been substantially cut to simplify and ease access to social services;

·         Psychological support services for those, who need them, are provided by the Ministry of Social Policy of Ukraine;

·         The Ukrainian authorities are doing their utmost to ensure continuous functioning in the Donbas region of objects of critical infrastructure that benefit local population;

·         Ukrainian sappers have cleared more than 1,000 mines and other ordnance from civilian structures;

·         More than 150,000 explosive remnants of war, including almost 1,000 of improvised explosive devices, purposefully set up by the Russian backed forces, have been rendered harmless;

·         Russians continue to disregard life and limb. On February 20 Ukrainian military medic Sabina Halytska was killed while riding in a vehicle clearly marked by a red cross. The vehicle was struck by a Russian antitank guided missile. She was only 23.

A few days earlier, on May 17, also at the Security Council, Ambassador Volodymyr Yelchenko, Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the UN, commenting on Russia’s arrogant deceit, challenged the UN system to hold accountable member-states’ support for peace and war by assessing their contributions to implementing the UN Charter. In other words, are they putting their money where their mouths are?

“In the history of the United Nations there are numerous examples of violations of the Charter. I will bring up the most recent and blatant one. Russia’s temporary occupation of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol and territories in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine clearly demonstrate that the violation of fundamental principles of international law by a permanent member of the Security Council is one of the most serious threats to peace and security,” Yelchenko observed.

“Just think back to mid-2013 and try to recall the situation in the world then. Now fast forward five years and look around. It is a dangerous downward spiral that we find ourselves in right now. The responsibility lies squarely with the Russian Federation, which without any remorse committed what is clearly defined by General Assembly resolution 3314 of 14 December 1974 as an act of aggression against my country both in Crimea and Donbas.”

Yelchenko said Russia’s “worrying trend” of “transgressions and wrongful acts” were also perpetrated in Moldova, Georgia and Syria.

The Ukrainian ambassador believes that Russia is able to commit these violations with impunity because of its “systematic abuse of the veto right and the blatant neglect by the said Council member of its obligation to maintain peace and security.” Simply stated, Russia is a shameless liar, everyone knows it and no one cares. Global leaders still throng to embrace Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.

Consequently, he continued, Ukraine is convinced that UN Security Council reform will be incomplete without at least limiting the veto power of law-breaking permanent members. Such a step would lead to increased Security Council’s accountability to the UN general membership.

Yelchenko underlined that Ukraine does not intend to use force against Russia to bring it into line with international norms but rather favors peaceful, legal and diplomatic means of conflict resolution. Ukraine counts on multilateralism, he added, by turning to the United Nations, OSCE, the Council of Europe and other international organizations, structures and mechanisms for support.

“And we will continue along that path. We are resorting to all means available to UN members-states to resolve the situation that arose as the result of the Russian military aggression against Ukraine,” he said.

In this vein, Ukraine initiated proceedings in the International Court of Justice against Russia regarding the Application of the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism and of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. In April, Ukraine requested the ICJ to provide a definitive interpretation of its order that was issued a year ago imposing provisional measures on Russia and remains unimplemented.

“We did this because the situation in the temporarily occupied Crimea continues to be characterized by gross violations of international humanitarian and human rights law and systematic persecution of Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars. We are also witnessing further deterioration of the security and humanitarian situation in the occupied territories of Donbas,” Yelchenko stated.

The Ukrainian ambassador reiterated Kyiv’s demand that Russia reverse the occupation of Crimea and eastern Ukraine, stop its aggression, withdraw its regular armed formations and mercenaries, weapons and equipment from temporarily occupied territories, and implement its commitments under the Minsk accords and international law, including international humanitarian law.

On the global stage, it is honorable to promote peaceful conflict resolution. Hopefully, the Ukrainian nation will not be annihilated before peaceful actions take hold.

Russia’s crimes against humanity grow. After four years, a Dutch-led international criminal investigation has concluded what most have known that the Buk missile that shot down civilian airliner Malaysian flight MH17 over Ukraine in 2014 came from Russia’s 53rd Antiaircraft Missile Brigade. MH17 was shot down over the conflict zone in Ukraine’s Donetsk region on July 17, 2014, killing all 298 people on board. The Joint Investigative Team (JIT), comprising officials from Australia, Belgium, Malaysia, the Netherlands and Ukraine, made the announcement at a press conference on May 24 in Utrecht, the Netherlands.

The JIT “has come to the conclusion that the Buk-TELAR that shot down MH17 came from the 53rd Antiaircraft Missile Brigade based in Kursk in Russia,” top Dutch investigator Wilbert Paulissen told reporters. “The 53rd Brigade is part of Russia’s armed forces.”

Furthermore, investigators led by Bellingcat, British investigative journalists’ website, identified conclusively that the person of interest known as “Andrey Ivanovich” or “Orion,” whose identity is sought by the Joint Investigating Team in connection with the criminal investigation into the downing of MH17, is in fact Russian citizen Oleg Vladimirovich Ivannikov, born on April 2, 1967.

Ivannikov must be declared a war crimes perpetrator, a criminal against humanity like Nazi Adolf Eichmann.

Bellingcat said it has determined with very high certainty that at the time of the downing of MH17, Ivannikov was an officer of the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Ministry of Defense (GRU), and served in that function until at least as late as September 2017.

The reporting team also said it has determined with high certainty that Ivannikov was the person with the covert name “Andrey Ivanovich,” who, according to multiple reports by Russian militant commanders and separatists fighting in the so-called Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR), was military adviser and de facto handler of the political leadership of the LNR in 2014. 

Bellingcat reported that Ivannikov was deployed in Ukraine at an undetermined point in the first half of 2014, and remained there at least until early 2015. During his undercover deployment to LNR, he coordinated and supervised the military activities of Russian militants, pro-Russian separatists and “private army” contingents from the Wagner group. Ivannikov also supervised the procurement and transport of weapons across the Russia Ukraine border.

As Russian crimes mount, they must be publically recorded so that future generations of Russians will feel the guilt and shame of their predecessors’ actions and ask, why did you kill Ukrainians and other innocent people. Russia, Putin, Ivannikov and Russian commanders and soldiers in Ukraine must be held accountable for their crimes in The Hague.

It will take courage, self-confidence and dedication to follow through with this suit and expelling Russia from the UN Security Council but without it, we will leave future generations vulnerable to Russian invasions, crimes, abuses and human rights violations.