2 June 2022
Excellencies,
Let me start by thanking the United States, Ambassador Linda Thomas Greenfield and her team, for the excellent way in which they conducted the work of the Security Council during the month of May.
I would like to thank the President of ICJ, Judge Donoghue, High Commissioner Bachelet and professor Akande for their important information provided.
Colleagues,
Differences in opinion, disagreements, and divisions are not unusual in this Council or in the wider UN membership. They are part of life, including international life as well, but they are magnified if we focus only on the here and now, on everyday politics and concerns, for short terms goals and narrow interests.
Yet, underneath such obvious arguments, fundamental values still exist and it is them that make the international community get together. These values represent the moral bonds that render the international community “a community”, where the sum is always more than its parts. Such values and norms are sanctioned in what we commonly call the International Law.
They reveal their true meaning and their real power in times of difficulty, of crisis, of conflicts and wars.
And, as we know, they have not come easy.
Tens of millions of people have had to die before we could discover and accept basic principles of international law. States have created vast body of law to regulate their behaviour and have voluntarily committed to abide by it.
Millions more have been sacrificed for us to accept our collective responsibility to abide by the rules and hold ourselves to account when we are unable or unwilling to respect them.
Yet, our basic values enshrined in the growing body of international law, humanitarian law, international human rights law, and international criminal law, continue to be systematically and grossly violated.
Distinguished delegates,
All serious violations of the international law must be treated with the same level of fairness and determination because they are part of the same problem. As per the wise words of Martin Luther King, “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
As we speak and reiterate the need for upholding our shared values and norms, we all are aware that both are under enormous stress.
We know that when we fail to stand up firmly and assume our collective responsibility, when we fail to uphold the right to truth, the right to justice, and the right to an effective remedy and reparation, our institutions grow weaker and public trust fades away. We are then left with frustration and impatience about lack of progress, about absence of delivery and with perpetrators looming large.
War crimes, crimes against humanity, and other gross violations of human rights undermine the fabric of entire societies. We have seen how they destabilize States, jeopardize whole regions, threatening international peace and security.
The case of the 11 years-old conflict in Syria is a tragic example. In failing to hold the Syrian regime accountable for its crimes against its own people, we may have encouraged atrocities elsewhere.
But failure to address all violations everywhere should not be a reason not to act nowhere.
This brings me to the tragic and ongoing Russian aggression against Ukraine. This reprehensible act has violated everything this Council stands for, the values, the norms, the law and the respect we owe each other as responsible members of the same community of nations.
An unprovoked, unjustified and illegal war has caused undue pain to the entire Ukrainian nation. It has challenged European security, has shaken the world economy and, by exacerbating food security, is causing undue pain to millions of people worldwide.
Horrible crimes committed are uncovered every day. This calls for accountability. Crimes should not and must not remain unpunished.
Albania has been and will continue to be at the forefront of efforts to deliver justice and deter further and future crimes.
Collègues,
Nous devons démontrer, en actes et pas seulement en paroles, que «plus jamais ça» veut dire, en vrai, « plus jamais ça » !
Nous le devons aux milliers de victimes du génocide à Srebrenica, au Rwanda et au Darfour.
Nous le devons à tous ceux qui ont subi des atrocités, des massacres et des crimes contre l’humanité.
Nous le devons à ces inombrables visages silencieux et la plupart du temps invisibles de crimes sexuels impardonnables, comme les 20 000 femmes brutalement violées durant le netoyage ethnique in Kosovo, en 1998-1999.
Nous le devons aux vies brisées de millions d’enfants qui ont été privés de leur avenir par des hommes forts armés.
C’est pourquoi il est d’une importance cruciale pour nous tous de résister fermement et continuellement à toute tentative de nier ou de relativiser ces crimes odieux. La glorification des criminels et des négationnistes du génocide sont des appels directs à la violence.
Ils doivent être condamnés sans hésitation.
Colleagues,
We must do more. To strengthen what we have achieved and build new tools to address new challenges.
Accountability breeds responsibility;
Responsibility leads to action;
Action reinforces justice;
Justice contributes to peace.
Without strong and effective accountability, our shared norms and values will wither away. We must not let violations become the norm.
Perpetrators should not have a place in our world, but only in theirs: behind bars, just as it happened for Milosevic, for Charles Taylor, for Mladic and whoever puts itself above the law.
We must make impunity history;
Justice, this indispensable companion of truth, must prevail, in the name of our shared humanity.
Thank you!