Thank you Mr. Vice President
Georgia aligns itself with the statement made by EU, and in my national capacity, I would like to add the following.
Excellences, we have gathered today at yet another emergency session on Ukraine. This time to address the devastating humanitarian consequences that are unfolding in Ukraine following the Russian aggression.
Following a month of unprovoked and unjustified war on Ukraine, hundreds of innocent civilians have been killed, including more than 100 children. Massive indiscriminate and targeted shelling of Ukrainian cities and towns have reduced to rubble schools, kindergartens, medical facilities and residential buildings, among others. And over 3.5 million Ukrainians were forced to flee to seek the shelter in the neighboring countries, and about 6.5 have turned into Internally Displaced Persons.
These numbers already signal the looming unprecedented humanitarian disaster in Europe and beyond.
Georgia strongly condemns Russia’s unprovoked, unjustified, premeditated aggression against Ukraine, in blatant violation of International Law, the Charter of the United Nations and the Helsinki Final Act. We call on Russia to comply with the provisional measures of the International Court of Justice of 16 of March that binds Russia, and I quote: “immediately suspend the military operations that it commenced on 24 February 2022 in the territory of Ukraine” end quote.
According to the OHCHR, most of civilian casualties recorded were caused by the use of explosive weapons with a wide impact area, including air strikes, shelling from heavy military artillery, multi-launch rocket systems and missiles. Also, Ukraine reports the use of the banned phosphorus munitions.
We are appalled by Russian forces attacks on journalists and medical staff and by the reports of rape, abductions and executions, looting and robberies with acts of violence against local residence and seizure of civilian housing. All of these actions are a grave violations of international humanitarian law and amount to war crimes.
These attacks must stop immediately! Humanitarian corridors and delivery of aid must be guaranteed for every civilian – for those who decide to stay and for those who choose to leave.
Dear colleagues,
This aggression served as a major wake up call for the international community. It is the fact that patterns of Russia’s actions and its scenarios against its neighbours are the same. Georgia experienced Russia’s full-scale military aggression in 2008 with blatant violation of all international rules and norms. This pattern of behavior that we now seeing in Ukraine, brazenly undermines the entire international rules-based order, poses grave threat to regional and global peace and security, and are inconsistent with the ways how responsible states should act in the 21st century.
Russia now plans to hold a fake referendum on creating the so-called “people’s republic” in Kherson, which echoes a bitter 8 year anniversary of sham referendum organized in the Crimean peninsula serving at that time as a pretext for Russia’s illegal annexation. In similar vein, on 12 of March, another so-called “parliamentary elections” were carried out in the Russia-occupied Abkhazia region of Georgia. Next month, on 10 April, similar illegal venture is planned in another Georgia’s occupied region –Tskhinvali of Georgia, all in blatant violation of principles of international law. And these so-called “referendums” and “elections” are null and void and serve as yet another futile attempt to legitimize Russian illegal occupation, but we do see the pattern, the pattern that is clear and evident here.
We urge Russia to cease aggression immediately, completely and without preconditions, to withdraw all its forces and armaments from the whole territory of Ukraine within its international recognized borders, and to allow immediate, safe and unfettered access to all international humanitarian and human rights actors and mechanisms.
Also we urge Russia to do same with regard to the occupied Georgian regions and fulfil its obligations under the Ceasefire Agreement of 12 of August of 2008.
Excellences,
The draft resolution before us today A/ES-11/L.2, is a humanitarian plea of millions of Ukrainians who bear the brunt of devastation caused by the needles war. At the core of this draft resolution lies the resolve of the international community to uphold the very principles of the UN Charter and the international law, with the primary objective to alleviate the suffering of the innocent civilians.
With this spirit, Georgia as one of the initiators and a co-sponsors of this draft resolution calls on all of you to vote in favour of the proposed draft, to vote in favor of the principal and in favor of the UN Charter.
I thank you.