UN Report Names Russia as a Violating Party for the First Time
Today, the United Nations officially releases the Secretary-General’s report on conflict-related sexual violence.
For the first time, the Russian Federation has been included in the list of offending parties.
This decision was not the result of a single day or a single statement. Behind it lie years of systematic work by Ukrainian diplomats, human rights defenders, international partners, and everyone who consistently documented Russia’s crimes and pursued international accountability.
As early as 2018, the Ukrainian delegation at the UN began systematically raising the issue of the Russian Federation’s crimes related to sexual violence during armed conflict, as well as crimes against Ukrainian children. It was then that the Permanent Mission of Ukraine to the UN, headed by Volodymyr Yelchenko — now Head of the International Policy Research Division at the Pylyp Orlyk Foundation, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine and Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the UN in 2016–2018 — consistently drew the attention of the international community to these issues.
The documentation of crimes, statements at meetings of the UN Security Council, and engagement with the special representatives of the UN Secretary-General, international human rights organizations, and member states continued year after year.
Within the framework of the UN “Children and Armed Conflict” mechanism, Ukraine raised the issues of the militarization of children, their illegal deportation, and attacks on educational institutions back when much of the world was not yet ready to acknowledge the scale of Russian crimes.
After February 24, 2022, this work took on a new scale, but its foundation had been laid long before the full-scale invasion.
Today’s decision is an important step on the path toward international accountability for Russia. It is a reminder that diplomacy rarely brings instant results. It requires years of persistent work, consistency, and professionalism. This is how international accountability is built. This is how, step by step, impunity is dismantled.
The Pylyp Orlyk Foundation expresses its respect to all Ukrainian diplomats, state institutions, human rights defenders, and international partners who were involved in this many years of work. Special gratitude goes to the people who survived violence yet found the strength to speak about what they endured and to testify for the sake of justice.
Justice takes time. But every such decision proves: systematic work produces results. Ukraine does not cease its fight for the truth, and Russia must be held accountable for all the crimes it has committed.
