Mr. President,

We thank the Special Rapporteur for her timely report highlighting the intrinsic link between biodiversity and cultural diversity.

For Ukraine, this link is not theoretical. Russia’s ongoing aggression has led to unprecedented devastation of our nature reserves and historic landscapes that are being deliberately destroyed.

Among the most severely affected sites is the Nyzhnyodniprovskyi National Nature Park in the Kherson region, which suffered catastrophic ecological losses following the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam in June 2023.

The Stone Grave Historical and Archaeological Reserve in the Zaporizhzhia region remains under occupation, placing its unique petroglyphs of global significance at serious risk, while the occupation of Askania-Nova Biosphere Reserve in the Kherson region, one of Europe’s oldest steppe reserves, resulted in ecosystem disruption and serious threats to rare species.

Since the start of the full-scale invasion, over 10,000 cases of environmental damage have been documented. Over 1,600 cultural heritage sites and nearly 2,500 cultural infrastructure facilities have been damaged or destroyed.

This is not collateral damage. It is a deliberate attempt to erase identity by destroying the natural and cultural ecosystems that sustain it — precisely the interdependence your report describes.

Madam Special Rapporteur,

How can the international community ensure accountability when environmental destruction and cultural erasure are used as tools of war?

I thank you!