Ukraine Re-elected to the UN Human Rights Council

The United Nations General Assembly has re-elected Ukraine to the UN Human Rights Council with a mandate for 2021-2023. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry’s press service reported about this, adding that Ukraine will fulfil its obligations to those who suffer from the occupying power on the Crimean Peninsula and in the Donbas-occupied territories.

“Permanently, we will raise the Russian aggression issue before the Council, and draw attention to the crimes and gross human rights violations committed by Russia as an occupying power. Also, we will work on the more active Council involvement, its special procedures, human rights treaty bodies to stop human rights violations and release of the Ukrainian citizens illegally detained by Russia fate,” the Foreign Ministry added.

At the same time, the department expressed concern about the Russian Federation re-election to this Council.

“There are concerns about the continuing membership of states, including a recent election’s result, that pursue a conscious policy of suppressing the rights of their citizens, and a neo-imperial aggressive policy against neighbouring states and repression of local people in the occupied territories,” the Ukrainian Ministry stressed.

To recap, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ third report on the human rights situation in the annexed Crimean Peninsula will form the basis of a draft of a new resolution on Crimea.

According to the Permanent Mission of Ukraine to the UN, the document “clearly shows Russia’s unwillingness as an occupying power to fulfil its international obligations.” The text deals with torture and ill-treatment by the Federal Security Service of Russia, the impunity for people involved in enforced disappearances in Crimea, interference in the professional journalists’ activities, forced relocations and deportations from Crimea.

Bohdan Marusyak