Mr Chair, during the last meeting of this Forum, on 10 June, the representative of the Russian Federation said that, in the context of civilian casualties, there are \u201cgaps in the knowledge of International Humanitarian Law\u201d of other States. We agree that civilian casualties are a tragedy.\u00a0 We agree that IHL is an important issue.<\/p>\n
That is why my statement will focus on both issues today. The OSCE\u2019s Code of Conduct compels every participating State to ensure their armed forces abide by international law. I will highlight three elements: civilian casualties; the treatment of children; and the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war. I will only cite independently-verified, internationally-respected sources.<\/p>\n
Firstly, on civilian casualties. Last week, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission confirmed that May 2026 was the deadliest month for civilians in Ukraine since April 2022: at least 274 killed and 1,763 injured \u2014 a 93 per cent increase on May 2025. Long-range missiles and drones accounted for 45 per cent of May\u2019s casualties, falling overwhelmingly on urban centres such as Kyiv and Dnipro, far from the front line. Along the front line itself, short-range drones killed and injured more civilians in May than in any month since the full-scale invasion began. International humanitarian law prohibits indiscriminate attacks, including those which are expected to cause excessive civilian harm in relation to the anticipated military advantage.<\/p>\n
Secondly, on the treatment of children. On 12 March the OHCHR\u2019s Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine concluded that Russian authorities have committed two distinct crimes against humanity against Ukrainian children \u2014 deportation and forcible transfer, and enforced disappearance. The Commission has verified that at least 1,205 children were taken from their homes. Four years on, 80 per cent have not been returned \u2013 instead they have been placed across 21 regions of Russia and the temporarily occupied territories. The Commission reported that it was \u201ca policy conceived and executed under the leadership at the highest level of the Russian Federation state apparatus\u201d. International humanitarian law affords children special protection in times of armed conflict. This includes protection from their forcible transfer or deportation from occupied territory.<\/p>\n
Thirdly, on sexual violence. ODIHR\u2019s Eighth Interim Report sets out the conflict-related sexual violence committed in areas under Russian control, the arbitrary detention of civilians, and the use of children in hostilities. The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission has separately documented the widespread and systematic torture and ill-treatment of Ukrainian prisoners of war by Russian authorities. This includes the use of sexual violence. International humanitarian law protects civilians from violence and exploitation. It also requires that all prisoners of war are treated humanely in all circumstances.<\/p>\n
Mr Chair, the UN, ODIHR and other international organisations continue to catalogue irrefutable independent evidence of Russia violating international law and international humanitarian law. As per the Code, such breaches are a \u201cdirect and legitimate\u201d concern for us all and we must act in solidarity with the affected State. The United Kingdom once again calls on Russia to withdraw fully from Ukraine\u2019s internationally recognised borders, to return every deported child, and to engage with independent and impartial investigations into all allegations of violations of international humanitarian law and abuses of international human rights law.<\/p>\n
Thank you Mr Chair.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mr Chair, during the last meeting of this Forum, on 10 June, the representative of the Russian Federation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":294292,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-655713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=655713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=655713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=655713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=655713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}