To protest Moscow’s war on Ukraine, roughly 100 diplomats from countries around the globe walked outRussian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov spoke at the United Nations Human Rights Council Tuesday.
Ukraine’s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Yevheniia Filipenko, led the walkout, which left a mostly empty conference hall to hear Lavrov’s pre-recorded video message during the council’s meeting on disarmament.
The Ukrainian envoy said that this action “sends a very strong signal” to Moscow that the Russian military’s ongoing invasion and assault is “not acceptable.”
Lavrov said he had originally planned to attend the session but was unable, due to the European Union, to travel to Switzerland. bannedFlights from Russia
According toThe New York Times:
He accused Ukraine of trying to acquire nuclear weapons. This unsubstantiated claim was used by Moscow as one of its justifications for the invasion. Ukraine gave up its Soviet-era nuclear arsenal1994 in exchange of security guarantees.
Mr. Lavrov repeated the Kremlin’s assertions that Ukraine had “made territorial claims against the Russian Federation, threatened to use force and acquire a military nuclear capability.” In earlier comments to the Conference on Disarmament, he said that Ukraine still possessed Soviet-era technology that would enable it to deliver such weapons, adding: “We cannot fail to respond to this real danger.”
Speaking just two days after Russian President Vladimir Putin put his country’s nuclear forces on special alertBelarus, and one day after Belarus agreed to host Russian nuclear weapons, Lavrov said that the Kremlin believes a “nuclear war cannot be won and should never be fought” — repeating a phrase adopted by Putin and U.S. President Joe Biden at a July 2021 summit.
The following are some of the highlights. Times reported:
Lavrov also suggested that the United States should withdraw its nuclear weapons from Europe and demolish the associated infrastructure.
The current “hysteria” in NATO and the European Union confirmed that “it was and still is the aim of the U.S. and all its allies built by Washington to create an ‘anti-Russia,’” he said.
Lavrov’s remarks came just before the Russian Defense Ministry warned Kyiv residents to leave their homes immediately as Russia’s forces advanced on the Ukrainian capital and announced plans to bomb targets in the city.
On Tuesday, a Russian missile was launched. struck the main square of Kharkiv, killing at least seven people, injuring dozens, and damaging an administrative building in Ukraine’s second-largest city.
