That’s according to a group of independent UN human rights experts who said in a statement released on Wednesday they are urgently seeking confirmation of reports regarding the death of Roshchyna, who was forcibly disappeared in August 2023. The uncertainty surrounding her fate has inflicted anguish on her family, the UN Human Rights Council-appointed experts
Read MoreIn a briefing to the UN Human Rights Council on Tuesday, UN rights chief Volker Türk highlighted the widespread devastation and violations of international law that have defined the conflict. He noted that July 2024 was the deadliest month for civilians since October 2022, with a sharp rise in casualties due to large-scale Russian attacks
Read More“These are deliberate Russian attacks on our powerplants and entire energy grid,” he said, noting that it has destroyed all Ukrainian thermal power plants and a large part of the hydro-electric capacity. “This is how [President] Putin is preparing for winter, hoping to torment millions of Ukrainians – ordinary families, women and children, and ordinary
Read MoreCondemning the daytime attacks, the UN’s top aid coordinator in Ukraine, Denise Brown, said that several cities were targeted, including the capital, Kyiv, Kryvyi Rih and Pokrovsk. The attacks happened just “as people were starting their day. Dozens of people have been killed and injured,” said Ms. Brown, who reported heavy damage to the children’s hospital
Read MoreRafael Grossi, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said the targeting marked a “major escalation” in the level of danger facing the power plant. It was the first time since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 that the ZNPP – Europe’s largest nuclear power plant – has been directly targeted.
Read MoreAccording to the Monitoring Mission, interviews conducted with 60 recently released Ukrainian POWs painted a harrowing picture of their experiences in Russian captivity. “Almost every single one of the Ukrainian POWs we interviewed described how Russian servicepersons or officials tortured them during their captivity, using repeated beatings, electric shocks, threats of execution, prolonged stress positions
Read MoreOvernight, Russian armed forces reportedly launched 158 missiles and drones in several waves targeting locations across Ukraine, including in Kyiv, Lviv, Kharkiv, Khmelnytskyi, Dnipropetrovsk, Sumy, Cherkasy, Odesa and Zaporizhzhia regions. In a statement issued by his spokesperson, Secretary-General António Guterres underscored that attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure “violate international humanitarian law, are unacceptable and
Read MoreThe deaths of over 10,000 civilians have been verified by the UN human rights office, OHCHR, since the invasion began in February 2022, although the actual number of fatalities could be much higher. Over 10 million people have been forced to flee their homes, including more than 6.3 million who have sought refuge outside Ukraine.
Read MoreUnited Nations agencies have continued to provide aid to Ukrainians in a war which has left at least 10,000 civilians dead and 3.7 million displaced in the country and 5.9 million abroad, as of November. Ms. Brown spoke to UN News as she visited Kupiansk, a small town on the front line in the east of Ukraine,
Read MoreA landmine warning sign behind a fence of a destroyed house in Posad-Pokrovske in the Kherson region of Ukraine. “Blackberries grew in front of my house and local children constantly ate them,” he told UN human rights monitors. “Now the blackberries are drying up and no one touches them. This makes me very sad.” As invading
Read More