On Monday, top UN officials asked for an investigation of Russia’s aggression against women during its invasion of Ukraine, as well as the protection of children caught up in the war. ‘Rape and sexual assault are becoming more common. To guarantee justice and accountability, these claims must be examined independently’, Sima Bahous, the head of the United Nations Women’s Agency, stated at a Security Council meeting in New York.
It was unclear if any investigation would be allowed by the Security Council, where Russia holds veto power. ‘This conflict must end. Right now’, Bahous stated. According to Bahous, the combination of massive displacement, a big presence of conscripts and mercenaries, and the cruelty shown to the Ukrainian people has activated all red lights.
Russia, on the other hand, rejected Security Council members’ statements again on Monday. Russia’s deputy UN ambassador, Dmitry Polyansky, asked the group to accept the ‘presumption of innocence’ and emphasized that his country’s ‘special military operation’ was intended to ‘defend Ukraine’s future’. ‘We know and witness – and we want you to hear our voices – that Russian invaders in Ukraine are now using violence and rape as a weapon of war’, President of the rights group La Strada-Ukraine, Kateryna Cherepakha, informed the Council via video.
The claims were rejected by Russia’s deputy UN ambassador, who accused Ukraine and its supporters of having a clear desire to depict Russian soldiers as ‘sadists and rapists’. According to a BBC report, they have independently looked out and unearthed rising evidence of rape being employed as a punishment strategy by the invading army. Their study contains graphic accounts of sexual abuse against women and girls of all ages.
In one case, a 50-year-old lady was raped and her husband was murdered; in another, a 16-year-old girl was raped in the street in front of her 25-year-old sister, with invading soldiers saying, ‘This will happen to every Nazi prostitute’. According to the same BBC story, Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman, Lyudmyla Denisova, has stated that more such cases are being investigated.
‘During the occupation, some 25 girls and women aged 14 to 24 were methodically raped in the basement of one Bucha home. Nine of them are expecting . Russian troops threatened to rape them to the point that they would refuse sexual contact with any male in order to prevent them from having Ukrainian children,’ she stated.
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