Remember Bucha; President Zelenskyy Demands that UN Punish Russia

A few days after the world learned of the unspeakable atrocities committed against the civilian population of Bucha by withdrawing Russian soldiers, President Zelenskyy came to the United Nations Security Council to denounce Russia, one of the founding members of the UN, and demand its expulsion from this body.

If the United Nations can’t punish an aggressor and violator of the UN Charter like the murderous predator Russia in order to protect the international community from premeditated ruination at the hands of global outlaws, Zelenskyy asserted on Tuesday, April 5, then the international organization should be dissolved.

“And now we need decisions from the Security Council. For peace in Ukraine. If you do not know how to adopt this decision, you can do two things,” Zelenskyy challenged the UN’s highest executive organ.

“Remove Russia as an aggressor and a source of war from blocking decisions about its own aggression, its own war. And then do everything that can establish peace.

“Or show how you can reformat and really work for peace.

“Or if your current format is unalterable and there is simply no way out, then the only option would be to dissolve yourself altogether.”

Zelenskyy hellfire and brimstone appearance at the UN was anticipated ever since he visited Bucha and experienced for himself the emotional pain of seeing old and young Ukrainians butchered by Russian invaders. Photos and video clips of murders and devastation have appeared in news media since the weekend.

He surely saw one blackened body that had arms raised in supplication, the face contorted in a horrible scream. He saw a blackened body of a woman on the street, faced won. The skull of another had a bullet hole in the left temple. The small blackened foot of a child could be seen in the jumble of charred bodies piled together. The six burned and blackened corpses were just the latest gruesome scene to be seared into Zelenskyy memory.

The President of Ukraine saw the pile of bodies just off a residential street, near a colorful and empty playground, visible to passersby as they warily went outdoors to collect aid. In a house nearby, the twisted and bloody body of a young man who had been shot to death lay in the basement entrance. At least four other bodies lay strewn in the street, one with the eye gouged out, apparently by a bullet. Another body that of a male was in a storm drain.

These images must have prompted Zelenskyy to declare prior to speaking to the UN Security Council that it would be impossible to continue negotiating with the Russians after accusing Moscow of genocide.

“It might happen that there will be no negotiations,” Zelenskyy said on Ukrainian state TV on Tuesday. Zelenskyy said it would be understandable to not speak to Putin after accusing Russian troops of carrying out war crimes in Ukraine. “It would be easy to say I’m not going to talk to you -- and it would be understandable, after what you have done, that’s why.”

In his video appearance at the UN, Zelenskyy recounted, “It is difficult to find a war crime that the occupiers have not committed there. The Russian military searched for and purposefully killed anyone who served our state. They executed women outside the houses when approaching and simply calling someone alive. They killed whole families - adults and children. And they tried to burn their bodies.”

He continued, “I am addressing you on behalf of the people who honor the memory of the deceased every day. Every day, in the morning. The memory of the killed civilians. Who were shot in the back of the head or in the eye after being tortured. Who were shot just on the streets. Who were thrown into the well, so that they die there in suffering. Who were killed in apartments, houses, blown up by grenades. Who were crushed by tanks in civilian cars in the middle of the road. For fun. Whose limbs were cut off, whose throat was cut. Who were raped and killed in front of their own children. Their tongues were torn out only because they did not hear from them what they wanted to hear.”

He added that the “Russian militaries are openly looting the cities and villages they have captured. This is looting of the highest scale. They steal everything from food to gold earrings they just rip out with blood.” But he didn’t mention the 11 Russian heroes who raped and sodomized a 9-year-old girl after killing her parents. This group carved a “Z” on her chest and took group selfies for their mothers. He didn’t mention that open air markets in Belarus are selling crucifixes ripped off dead Ukrainian children.

Zelenskyy reminded the Security Council members that these heinous crimes were committed by a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. This unpunished behavior “destroys the internal unity of states. Destroys state borders. Promotes hatred at the state level and seeks to export it to other countries through its system of propaganda and political corruption.”

Accusing the United Nations of inaction, Zelenskyy questioned where is the security that the Security Council is expected to provide.

“I would like to remind you of the first article of the first chapter of the UN Charter. What is the purpose of our organization? To maintain peace. And to force to peace. Now the UN Charter is being violated literally from the first article. And if so, what is the point of all other articles,” Zelenskyy stated.

“Today, it is as a result of Russia’s actions on the territory of my state, on the territory of Ukraine, that the most heinous war crimes of all time since the end of World War II are being committed. Russian troops are deliberately destroying Ukrainian cities to ashes with artillery and air strikes.”

The Ukrainian President said the massacre in Bucha is just one of many examples of what the occupiers have been doing in Ukraine for 41 days and there are other victimized towns: Mariupol, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Okhtyrka, Borodyanka and dozens of other Ukrainian communities.

If this behavior continues unchecked, he said, it will result in countries taking arms to resolve problems rather than turning to international law.

“The power of the UN Charter must be restored immediately. The UN system must be reformed immediately so that the right of veto is not a right to kill. So that there is a fair representation of all regions of the world in the Security Council,” he said. “The aggressor must be forced to peace immediately. Determination is needed.”

Zelenskyy demanded that the Russian military and those who gave them orders be immediately brought to justice for war crimes in Ukraine. “Everyone who gave criminal orders and fulfilled them by killing people will face a tribunal similar to the Nuremberg trials.”

Turning to Russia, he reminded the member-state that the likes of Ribbentrop and Eichmann were eventually captured and executed.

“Prevent aggression and force aggressors to peace. Have the determination and ability to punish if the principles of peace are violated,” he said of the need to prevent wars and bloodshed while ensuring peace.

The Russian massacre of civilians and the rape of girls in Bucha have left a deep wound in the Ukrainian national psyche that will surely fester for generations. Much of the grief is vented in the Ukrainian and Russian languages through personal reflections, essays, videos, poems and even comedy. In one of poems, a woman expresses the story of a girl who apologizes to her mother for having to leave her life, her body after being viciously raped and left without her natural ability to be a mother sometime in the future.

Another eye witness wrote that what people now see in Ukrainian towns Bucha, Irpin, and Hostomel reminds of the pictures of wars in the former Yugoslavia: the completely ruined Croatian town of Vukovar; Bosnian villages, with blown-up roofs, executed men and boys in the Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica, mass rapes, and mass graves. However, it is not necessary to compare Russian atrocities of today to previous violent crimes against humanity. Russia alone occupies an honored spot in the premier league of murderers.

Russian invaders came to plunder and kill for joy. They kill people, their cattle, and their pets and destroy everything they cannot take with them. For them, men and women of all ages are just their prey to be hunted, pillaged, tortured, and raped.

A soldier wrote verses to his mother telling her that on the frontline he learned to pray. I talked with God and came to believe that without sincere prayers, we will not achieve victory, he wrote.

The newsreels documented wherever the professional or amateur cameraman went the Ukrainian people’s reborn hatred for Russia, Russians and Putin.

You can read the full text of President Zelenskyy address here: https://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/vistup-prezidenta-ukrayini-na-zasidanni-radi-bezpeki-oon-74121

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