New York (Union)
The UAE affirmed the need to stop hostilities, protect civilians and reach a peaceful solution to the conflict in Ukraine, renewing the call on the parties to comply with their obligations under international humanitarian law, including respect for the principles of necessity, proportionality and distinction.
Yesterday, the UAE said in a statement before a meeting of the Security Council in the “Arria” formula on the Ukrainian crisis: “Civilians and civilian objects should not be the targets of attacks.” Even before last February.
In the statement made by Ghasaq Shaheen, a member of the UAE mission to the United Nations, she added: “We are all aware of the enormous human cost of the war in Ukraine since it began last year, but we are aware that the suffering of civilians did not only begin since that time, according to the estimates of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Humans killed nearly 3,400 civilians and injured more than 7,000 people between April 2014 and December 2021 as a result of the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
During the statement, Shaheen called on the parties to comply with their obligations under international and humanitarian law, and to respect the principles of necessity, proportionality and discrimination, as civilians and civilian objects should never be the targets of attacks, noting that the Security Council, in its Resolution No. 2573 adopted less than two years ago, reinforced the principle of The need for parties to armed conflicts to refrain from targeting objects that are indispensable for the survival of the civilian population, whether by attack, destruction, removal or rendering them useless.
The statement said: “We are still receiving reports of the killing and wounding of civilians and the damage and destruction of vital infrastructure. Perhaps the latest tragic example of this is the bombing of a residential building in the city of Dnipro last Saturday, which requires priority to be given to protecting civilians.”
He stressed the need to ensure that aid reaches those in need, pointing out that millions of civilians in Donetsk and Luhansk provinces needed to receive humanitarian aid even before last February, and during that period many civilians near what was then called the contact line suffered from difficulties in obtaining aid. Humanitarian aid and basic services. The statement added: “With the intensification of the conflict, the challenges facing the difficulty of delivering humanitarian aid increased, noting that although many civilians fled due to violent operations from areas such as Bakhmut, many who were unable to leave, especially the elderly, remain at risk.”
He also stressed the importance of ensuring safe and unimpeded access for humanitarian workers to those in need, noting that the events of recent weeks were a stark reminder of the dangers faced by international aid organizations and their workers, especially the bombing of the International Committee of the Red Cross office in Donsk and the killing of an aid worker while distributing food. .
At the end of the statement, the UAE stressed once again the urgent need to stop hostilities and reach a peaceful solution to the conflict, stressing that the time has come to pave a path towards a just and sustainable peace, and until this is achieved, civilians in Ukraine will remain under the brunt of this fierce conflict.
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