Ukraine at OSCE: Russia's actions are crime of genocide

"Each week of Russia's war of aggression brings new reports of destruction and death. Last weekend in Ukraine began with Russian missile attacks, again targeting critical civilian infrastructure. On that day, October 22, Russia launched 36 missiles. According to the Ministry of Energy, the Russian occupiers damaged up to 40% of Ukraine's energy infrastructure," Yevhenii Tsymbalyuk, Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the International Organizations in Vienna, said during the OSCE Permanent Council meeting, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

He also drew attention to reports of the Russians mining one of the largest Ukrainian energy facilities – the Kakhovka HPP. If it collapses, 80 settlements, including Kherson city, could be flooded, and the Zaporizhzhia NPP would be left without water for cooling.

"There is an increasing number of reports coming on the forced deportation of local residents, especially children, from Kherson region. In addition, the Russian Federation continues to kill Ukrainian children, born and unborn. Two days ago, two people, including a pregnant woman, were killed in another missile attack on Dnipro. An 8-year-old boy from Bakhmut lost his father and seven months pregnant mother during shelling," the ambassador said.

According to him, since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine and as of October 26, 430 children were killed and at least 822 children were injured. And these are not final data, since a significant territory is captured by Russia.

"At the same time, more and more traces of Russian crimes are being discovered in the liberated territories. Currently, 22 torture chambers have been discovered in Kharkiv region. This is what genocide looks like," said the Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the International Organizations in Vienna.

He recalled how the international convention defines the signs of this terrible international crime: "Killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."

Tsymbalyuk emphasized that Russia's actions in Ukraine fell under the definition of this crime. "Deliberate attacks on critical civilian infrastructure of Ukraine, forced deportation and adoption of Ukrainian children, sexual violence, torture, indiscriminate shelling, etc. – all Russia’s actions fall under the definition of this crime," he said.

The Ukrainian diplomat pointed out that the trial of Félicien Kabuga for crimes committed during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, which began this fall in The Hague, was a reminder of how dangerous misinformation and incitement to aggressive genocide are. "The recent case with Russia Today, whose presenter urged last weekend to ‘throw Ukrainian children into the river or burn them in the house’, is indicative in this regard, but not an isolated one. The top Kremlin propagandists continue to call for the destruction of entire Ukrainian cities," Tsymbalyuk said.

On February 24, Russia began a new stage of the war against Ukraine – a full-scale invasion. The invaders shell and bomb the Ukrainian cities and villages, torturing and killing civilian population.

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