Remarks in exercise of the right of reply
by the Permanent Representative of Ukraine,
Ambassador Yurii KLYMENKO
at the ai 2 General Debates of the 27th session
of the Human Rights Council
(Geneva, September 8, 2014)
Mr. President,
In reply to the statement delivered earlier today by the delegation of the Russian Federation I would like to say the following.
We truly appreciate humanitarian assistance provided to the population in the South-Eastern regions of Ukraine, in addition to the relevant efforts by the Ukrainian Government, by EU, USA, Canada, Estonia, Georgia, Japan, Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary and other countries, including the Russian Federation.
We wish to express our hope that such assistance will be provided in strict compliance with the relevant international rules, norms and standards in close cooperation with and full respect to the ICRC and under its auspices without any attempts of voluntary interpretation of timing, way of transportation, identification of the needs and the principles of the international law as such.
As for the causes of the current situation in the South-East of Ukraine we would like to reiterate: as soon as the Russian Federation stops the intervention therein, unimpeded crossing of its state border with Ukraine on the territory controlled by the terrorist groups,the human rights and humanitarian situation will quickly stabilize without any further need of sending multi-kilometer convoys of half empty trucks.
Especially appalling is the fact that in support to those terrorists the regular troops of the Russian Federation were cynically sent through the very same segment of the state border to Ukraine on its National Holiday - Independence Day.
We have to underline that there are abundant evidences of such Russian invasion, provided not only by the Ukrainian side but also by the reliable sources of information,including very explicit satellite imagery,of NATO, OSCE, their Member-States and reputed international NGOs, in particular Amnesty International.
We wish to share hope expressed by the Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation that the results of the Contact Group’s meeting last Friday in Minsk will be in good faith and comprehensively implemented. At the same time,it is discouraging that despite Ukraine’s complete adherenceto the document signed in Minsk, the illegal armed groups supported by Russia continue sporadic shelling of the Ukrainian territory.
В этой связи хотелось бы верить, что российская сторона будет придерживаться одинаковых подходов к террористам. Поддерживаем призыв российской делегации к Совету по Правам Человека относительно того, что сигнал СПЧ должен быть однозначным – террористы получат по заслугам, где бы они не находились.
To conclude, Mr. President, let me express my strong personal beliefthat settlement of the situation in the South-East of my country to a great extent depends on the good will of the Russian Federation, in particular,with regard to the control of the segment of the Ukrainian–Russian state border adjacent to the part of the Ukrainian territory temporarily controlled by illegal armed groups. I simply can’t believe that the country which ambitiously considers a piloted space flight to another planet - Mars - is unable to control less than 200 kilometers of its state border.
I thank you.