Intervention by Permanent Representative of Ukraine under agenda item 2 of the 31st HRC session - Annual report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights

March 10, 2016

Mr. President,

Ukraine welcomes today’s dialogue with the High Commissioner who paid in his statement attention to human rights situation in my country.

It goes without saying that the root cause of its deterioration is clearly the ongoing Russian military aggression and subversive actions against my country.

We would like to emphasize that its improvement will not be achieved until the Russian troops and fighters withdraw from Donbas and the illegal armed groups are disarmed as envisaged by the Minsk agreements.

So far Russia has shown no signs of de-occupation of Crimea and Donbas, moreover it strengthens its military grip on the occupied territories. In this regard we insist on the crucial importance of the Minsk Agreements and their implementation by the Russian Federation that fails to deliver on its commitments, in particular on unconditional release of hostages and political prisoners, including Nadiya Savchenko.

We consider the work of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine as an effective tool for documenting numerous human rights violations caused by the occupation authorities in Crimea as well as the crimes of the Russian army, Russia-backed illegal armed groups and mercenaries in certain areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions.We are committed to investigating all of them, bringing to justice those responsible as well as to implementation of comprehensive reforms that, despite the ongoing external aggression, are on the way. The important part of them is the National Human Rights Strategy and the respective National Action Plan - both elaborated with the engagement and technical assistance from the UN, for what we are grateful, as well as for OHCHR’s efforts on advocating constitutional and legislative reforms.

Ukraine remains committed to close cooperation with the OHCHR and other international human rights mechanisms, as well as to taking on board their recommendations.

Thank you.