Joint statement of the Group of Friends of Accountability for the Aggression against Ukraine – High Level Side event: 10 years of Russia’s assault on human rights and fundamental freedoms in Ukraine at the 55th Session of UN Human Rights Council

Delivered by Albania on behalf of the Group of Friends
26 February 2024 – Geneva, Switzerland

Mr/Madam Chair, Ministers, Vice-Ministers, colleagues,

I am pleased to deliver this statement on behalf of the 'Group of Friends of Accountability following the aggression against Ukraine’, a cross-regional group consisting of 47 States and the European Union.

As we gather today in the comfort of the Palais des Nations our Ukrainian friends are facing another day of untold suffering at the hands of Russia. For those in Crimea and in parts of the Donbas, it’s been ten years.

The humanitarian needs of civilians in Ukraine are constantly rising.

For more than two years now, since the launch of Russia’s full-scale, unprovoked and illegal war of aggression against Ukraine, children have learned to sleep and study on underground subway platforms, as they shelter from continuous attacks. On those days children are not sheltering underground from Russian bombs, parents have lived in fear, not knowing whether their children would come home.

Mr/Madam Chair, for two years now, this has been the grim reality for all Ukrainians. While for ten years Ukrainians in Crimea and parts of the Donbas have been forced to live this way.

Report after report from independent mechanisms such as the Commission of Inquiry and the HRMMU, has concluded that the war against Ukraine is marked by war crimes, grave human rights violations, violations of international human rights law, and that certain actions by the Russian Federation may constitute crimes against humanity.

Dignity and justice must be restored for the countless victims of this war and those responsible must be held to account.

We welcome the initiatives to ensure full accountability for the most serious crimes under international law committed in Ukraine, including the work of Ukraine’s authorities, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, the International Centre for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine the establishment of the Register of Damage for Ukraine, and the work of the Core Group on options for the establishment of a tribunal on the crime of aggression against Ukraine. We further commend the independent investigations under the OSCE Moscow Mechanism, ODIHR’s Ukraine Monitoring Initiative, the Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, and the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, mandated by the UN Human Rights Council, for independently presenting the world with evidence of Russia’s violations of international law, including international humanitarian law.

Finally, we would like to acknowledge the important and courageous work of the manifold Ukrainian organisations who tirelessly continue to monitor and document violations of human rights and international humanitarian law in their country. Their testimonies are crucial contributions to victim-centered accountability efforts.

Our nations will remain steadfast in our support of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people in their tireless fight for freedom and dignity.

Minister Kuleba, we stand with you, shoulder to shoulder, as you walk along the path towards justice, accountability, and peace for your country and all victims of this aggression..

Thank you, Mr. Madam Chair/ President.