The United Kingdom, which holds the council’s presidency this month, announced late Monday that Zelenskyy would speak at the open meeting already scheduled for Tuesday to discuss the situation in Ukraine.
Zelenskyy will virtually address the UN’s most powerful body after receiving briefings from UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, his political chief Rosemary DiCarlo and UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths, who is trying to organize a halt immediate humanitarian fire and met with senior officials. Russian officials in Moscow on Monday and will soon head to Ukraine.
Videos and photos of the streets of the city of Bucha strewn with the corpses of what appeared to be civilians, some with their hands tied behind their backs, have sparked global revulsion, calls for tougher sanctions against Russia and its suspension from the summit. UN human rights. body, the Human Rights Council.
According to Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova, the bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from Bucha and other kyiv-area towns that were recently recovered from Russian troops.
Associated Press journalists reported seeing dozens of bodies in various locations in Bucha, northwest of the capital. The bodies included a group of nine in civilian clothes who appeared to have been shot at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs. A spilled bag of groceries was near one of the dead.
Russia’s ambassador to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, accused Ukraine and the West on Monday of “a false flag attempt” to blame Russian troops for atrocities in Bucha that he said were committed by Ukrainian nationalists. He called the video of bodies dumped in the streets “a gross forgery” and insisted that during Bucha’s time under Russian control, “no local person has suffered any violent action.”
At a press conference, the Russian ambassador showed brief video footage of the smiling mayor of Bucha on March 31 calling the withdrawal of Russian forces a victory for the Ukrainian army and never mentioning “mass atrocities, dead bodies, murders, graves or anything like that.” that.” He also showed footage from Ukrainian television on April 2 showing Ukrainian soldiers entering Bucha, “no dead bodies in the streets”.
He said Russia would present more “factual evidence” to the Security Council on Tuesday.
Nebenzia was asked if she believed that the videos of Ukrainian relatives talking about the deaths of loved ones killed by Russian troops were also fake. He replied: “This is war. In war anything happens. It cannot be excluded that civilians are dying. That is a sad fact of life.”
But again he charged that Bucha’s videos were “set up”.
Britain’s ambassador to the UN, Barbara Woodward, called Bucha’s footage “heartbreaking, horrific and likely evidence of war crimes and possibly genocide,” and said the Security Council must “think about how to deal with it.” “.
The council remains deadlocked on any action on Ukraine because Russia, as one of its five permanent members, has veto power. But the 193-member General Assembly, where there are no vetoes, has condemned the Russian invasion and demanded an immediate cessation of hostilities, the withdrawal of Russian forces and the protection of civilians.
US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield announced Monday that the United States would soon introduce a General Assembly resolution that would suspend Russia from the UN’s top human rights body, the 57-nation Human Rights Council, saying that there is increasing evidence that he committed war crimes in Ukraine. The council is based in Geneva, but its members are elected by the 193-nation General Assembly.
Thomas-Greenfield told NPR on Monday night that the United States plans to seek a vote “as soon as possible this week, and possibly on Thursday.”
Any resolution to suspend Russia’s membership rights would require the support of two-thirds of member countries voting “yes” or “no.” Assembly resolutions are not legally binding, unlike Security Council resolutions, but they are influential as a reflection of world opinion.
Russia had sought an emergency Security Council meeting to discuss Bucha on Monday afternoon, but Woodward told reporters that with Tuesday’s council meeting already scheduled “we didn’t see a good reason to have two meetings in a row on Ukraine.” .
Nebenzia was asked whether the US-led effort to suspend Russia from the human rights council and Britain’s refusal to hold an emergency Security Council meeting on Monday at Russia’s request would affect talks between Moscow and kyiv. .
“This will not facilitate or encourage or help what is happening between the Russia-Ukraine peace talks,” Nebenzia said.
Reference-www.washingtonpost.com