{"id":13666,"date":"2022-04-06T13:07:25","date_gmt":"2022-04-06T05:07:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=13666"},"modified":"2022-04-06T13:07:27","modified_gmt":"2022-04-06T05:07:27","slug":"in-u-n-speech-zelensky-accuses-russia-of-worst-war-crimes-since-ww2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=13666","title":{"rendered":"In U.N. speech, Zelensky accuses Russia of worst war crimes since WW2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>UNITED NATIONS, April 6<\/strong> &#8211; Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday that <em>&#8220;accountability must be inevitable&#8221;<\/em> for Russia as he accused invading Russian troops of committing <em>&#8220;the most terrible war crimes&#8221;<\/em> since World War Two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Zelensky showed a short video of burned, bloodied, and mutilated bodies, including children, in Irpin, Dymerka, Mariupol, and Bucha, where Ukraine accuses Russian troops of killing hundreds of civilians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Russia&#8217;s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia then told the Security Council that Russian troops are not targeting civilians, dismissing accusations of abuse as lies. He said that while Bucha was under Russian control, <em>&#8220;not a single civilian suffered from any kind of violence.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Zelensky questioned the value of the 15-member U.N. Security Council, which has been unable to take any action over Russia&#8217;s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine because Moscow is a veto power, along with fellow permanent council members the United States, France, Britain, and China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>&#8220;We are dealing with a state that turns its veto at the U.N. Security Council into the right to (cause) death,&#8221; Zelensky<\/em> said in a live video address from Ukraine&#8217;s capital Kyiv, urging reform of the world body. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>&#8220;Russia wants to turn Ukraine into silent slaves.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Russia says it is carrying out a <em>&#8220;special military operation&#8221;<\/em> that aims to destroy Ukraine&#8217;s military infrastructure and <em>&#8220;denazify&#8221;<\/em> it and denies attacking civilians. Ukraine, a parliamentary democracy, and Western countries say Moscow invaded without provocation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com\/reuters\/7GQ5VS7ZFBKEDD55RDIFZKKIAE.jpg\" alt=\"Zelensky\" width=\"472\" height=\"314\"\/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Russia&#8217;s partner China, which has abstained on most U.N. votes since the war started, was <em>&#8220;deeply disturbed&#8221;<\/em> by the images of civilian deaths in Bucha, China&#8217;s U.N. Ambassador Zhang Jun said, calling for verification of what happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">India, which relies heavily on Russia for military hardware and has also abstained from U.N. action, condemned the killings in Bucha and called for an independent investigation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Russia&#8217;s Nebenzia said <em>&#8220;We are not shooting against the civilian targets in order to save as many as civilians possible. This is precisely why we&#8217;re not advancing as fast as many expected.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8216;SHOW BACKBONE&#8217;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said responsible world powers and global leaders need to &#8220;show backbone &#8211; and stand up to Russia&#8217;s dangerous and unprovoked threat against Ukraine and the world.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>&#8220;No one can be a shield for Russia&#8217;s aggression,&#8221;<\/em> she said as Washington pushes to suspend Russia from the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The 193-member U.N. General Assembly in New York is likely to vote on the move to suspend Russia on Thursday, diplomats said. A two-thirds majority of present voting members is needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Nebenzia responded, <em>&#8220;I hope that our colleagues from the United Nations will not allow themselves to be manipulated and play up to Washington.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The United Nations said some 11 million Ukrainians &#8212; more than a quarter of the population &#8212; have fled their homes. More than 4 million of those people have left Ukraine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths said at least 1,430 civilians have been killed, including more than 121 children. <em>&#8220;We know this is likely a serious underestimate,&#8221;<\/em> he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Griffiths, who is seeking a humanitarian truce in Ukraine, said &#8220;we have a long road ahead of us&#8221; after what he described as a &#8220;frank&#8221; meeting with Russia&#8217;s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Moscow on Monday. Griffiths said he hopes to travel to Ukraine on Wednesday to meet with Ukrainian officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">U.N. political affairs chief Rosemary DiCarlo said U.N. human rights monitors were seeking to verify allegations of sexual violence by Russian forces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>&#8220;These include gang rape and rapes in front of children,&#8221; she said. &#8220;There are also claims of sexual violence by Ukrainian forces and civil defense militias.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned the Security Council that Russia&#8217;s invasion of Ukraine is one of the greatest challenges ever to the international order <em>&#8220;because of its nature, intensity, and consequences.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/\">NMT<\/a> as reported by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/un-chief-warns-ukraine-war-one-greatest-challenges-international-order-2022-04-05\/\">Reuters<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>UNITED NATIONS, April 6 &#8211; Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told the United Nations Security Council&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13667,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10892,59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-war","category-world"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01.png",889,582,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01-150x150.png",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01-300x196.png",300,196,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01-768x503.png",640,419,true],"large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01.png",640,419,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01.png",889,582,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01.png",889,582,false],"newsium-slider-full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01.png",889,582,false],"newsium-featured":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01.png",889,582,false],"newsium-medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screen-Shot-2022-04-06-at-13.01.01.png",720,471,false]},"author_info":{"info":["Editor"]},"category_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?cat=10892\" rel=\"category\">War<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?cat=59\" rel=\"category\">World<\/a>","tag_info":"World","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13666"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13666\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13668,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13666\/revisions\/13668"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}