The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on Monday urged Moscow to allow access to Ukrainian territory occupied by the Russian Federation to assess the human rights situation on the ground.
Volker Türk, who made this appeal to the Russian authorities on the occasion of the opening session of the 53rd session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, which will take place from Monday to July 14 in Geneva, Switzerland, focused his intervention on the issue of cooperation between the countries with the “ecosystem of international human rights organizations”, praised Ukraine’s cooperation but complained about Russia’s lack of openness.
“I urge the Russian Federation to cooperate with all international human rights organizations, including my own office, to resolve the serious human rights problems facing the country,” including “the closure of public spaces, lawsuits against human rights defenders , political opponents and critics and persistent allegations of torture and ill-treatment,” said the Austrian leader, who was appointed UN human rights chief by Secretary-General António Guterres less than a year ago.
With regard to the war in Ukraine, Türk stressed “the need to cooperate with the Council’s Commission of Inquiry” on human rights and that his team should have “access both to Ukrainian territory occupied by the Russian Federation and to the Russian Federation itself, especially to visit detained civilians, prisoners of war and Ukrainian children and disabled people who were brought to these areas”.
On Sunday, the UN reiterated its call for Russia to allow access to areas under its control for humanitarian aid to those affected by the June 6 destruction of the Kakhovka dam in southern Ukraine. but so far Russian authorities have rejected requests for access to areas under their temporary military control.
Regarding cooperation on the part of Kiev, the UN official pointed out that the monitoring mission “has free access to all territory under the control of the government, including places of detention of civilians and prisoners of war”, said that “the government is cooperating” in the implementation of the recommendations and the debate on our conclusions and congratulated that the cooperation with the Council’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry was also “meaningful, with access to all requested sites”.
“I encourage Ukraine to continue this approach by providing the Commission with all the information it requests,” he said.
At the end of his opening speech, Volker Türk underlined the growth of his firm over the 30 years of its existence and reiterated that he would like to see more involvement in countries such as Brazil, Mozambique and the United States, stating that it is also It is important to be present for the first time in China and India, “two countries that together represent more than a third of the world’s population”.
“It is equally important that the office step up our work in humanitarian situations – which often cause or greatly exacerbate human rights issues. […] To achieve these goals, we need to double the government’s budget in the coming years and we also need more political support,” he said.
“A strong UN human rights agency and a healthy, well-equipped human rights ecosystem are a global public good – especially in these turbulent times,” he concluded.
Established by the UN General Assembly, the Human Rights Council is an intergovernmental body responsible for strengthening the promotion and protection of human rights around the world, with the main mission of addressing situations of human rights violations and making recommendations thereon. doing.
Source: DN
