Speaking to the United Nations Security Council on the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Secretary of State Antony Blinken praised the spirit of the Ukrainian people while urging other countries not to “become numb” to the horrors of the war.
“Day after day of Russia’s atrocities, it’s easy to become numb to the horror, to lose our ability to feel shock and outrage, but we can never let the crimes Russia is committing become our new normal,” Blinken said Friday.
“Bucha is not normal. Mariupol is not normal. Irpin is not normal,” he said, listing sites of some of the worst incidents of the war. “Bombing schools and hospitals and apartment buildings to rubble is not normal. Stealing Ukrainian children from their families and giving them to people in Russia is not normal.”
“We must not let President Putin’s callous indifference to human life become our own,” Blinken continued. “We must force ourselves to remember that behind every atrocity in this wretched war, and in conflicts around the world, is a human being.”
Blinken’s comments came after the U.S. introduced new sanctions on Russian banks, firms, individuals and entities that helped Moscow evade existing sanctions, and announced a new $2 billion package of new military aid for Ukraine, including ammunition and high-tech drones.
The country’s top diplomat praised the international community for standing together in support of Ukraine, calling for other nations to “reaffirm our commitment to upholding what the U.N. Charter calls ‘the dignity and worth of the human person.’”
“Nations around the world continue to stand with Ukraine because we all recognize that if we abandon Ukraine, we abandon the U.N. Charter itself, and the principles and rules that make all our countries safer and more secure: No seizing land by force. No erasing another country’s borders. No targeting civilians in war,” he said.
“If we do not defend these basic principles, we invite a world in which might makes right, the strong dominate the weak,” Blinken continued, adding: “That’s the world this body was created to end, and members of this Council have a unique responsibility to make sure we don’t return to it.”
Blinken began his remarks by recalling what he said to the exact same body last year, one week before the invasion — “that Russia would manufacture a pretext, and then use missiles, tanks, soldiers, cyber attacks to strike pre identified targets, including chief with the aim of toppling Ukraine’s democratically elected government” — noting that Russia’s representative called those “groundless accusations.”
One week later, Russia’s invasion began.
Blinken hailed the “fierce resistance of Ukraine’s defenders” for causing Russian President Vladimir Putin to fail in his “primary objective” of conquering the country.
“When President Putin couldn’t break the Ukrainian military, he intensified efforts to break Ukrainian spirits,” he continued. “Over the last year, Russia has killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian men, women and children, uprooted more than 13 million people from their homes, destroyed more than half of the country’s energy grid, bombed more than 700 hospitals, 2,600 schools and abducted at least 6,000 Ukrainian children, some as young as four months old and relocated them to Russia.”
“And yet the spirit of the Ukrainians remains unbroken,” Blinken said. “If anything, it’s stronger than ever.”
Blinken called for an end to the conflict, saying that members of the U.N. Security Council “have a fundamental responsibility to ensure that any peace is just and durable” — while also seemingly taking a swipe at China’s call for a ceasefire.
“Council members should not be fooled by calls for a temporary or unconditional ceasefire,” Blinken said, suggesting that “Russia will use any pause in fighting to consolidate control over the territories illegally seized and replenish its forces for further attacks.”
“Members of this council should not fall into the false equivalency of calling on both sides to stop fighting, or calling on other nations to stop supporting Ukraine in the name of peace,” he continued. “No member of this council should call for peace while supporting Russia’s war on Ukraine and on the U.N. Charter.”
Blinken laid the blame for the war at the feet of Putin, making the case that he is the only person who can unilaterally end the conflict.
“In this war, there is an aggressor and there is a victim,” Blinken added. “Russia fights for conquest, Ukraine fights for its freedom. If Russia stops fighting and leaves Ukraine, the war ends. If Ukraine stops fighting, Ukraine ends.
“The fact remains: One man, Vladimir Putin, started this war. One man can end it.”
