A major dam in the Russian-controlled part of Ukraine’s southern Kherson region was blown up by Russian forces in the early hours of Tuesday, causing flooding in vast areas along the Dnieper River, according to Ukrainian officials.
Addressing the UN Security Council on Tuesday, Poland's Krzysztof Szczerski condemned the dam’s destruction, calling it “yet another outrageous act of Russian barbarity,” a grave violation of basic norms of humanitarian and environmental protection law as well as an apparent war crime, according to reports.
The Polish UN ambassador said that the attack posed a direct threat to civilians living along the Dnipro banks downstream and to the safety of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in the south of Ukraine.
The incident also brings the prospect of an environmental disaster with unprecedented consequences on a regional scale that will reverberate across Europe, Szczerski warned.
Moreover, it intensifies material losses and will result in further forced displacements of the local population on a mass scale, he said.
The Polish envoy pointed out that the consequences of Russia's ongoing war in Ukraine—including its humanitarian emergency and environmental disasters—affect his own country as a witness to the suffering of the Ukrainian people and a hub of international humanitarian assistance.
“It is a clear violation of all our efforts to highlight the importance of the climate and security nexus, nuclear safety, civilian protection in armed conflicts including children and women and the protection of critical infrastructure,” Szczerski told an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council.
He pledged that Poland would make every effort to hold Russia accountable before the international community and "punish the perpetrators of this criminal act" through relevant international institutional and legal mechanisms, including humanitarian and environmental ones.
Szczerski called on Moscow to immediately stop its war of aggression and told the UN Security Council that Ukraine deserves every assistance it needs, calling on member states and the international community to "stand by the values and norms of international law."
Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, launching the largest military campaign in Europe since World War II.
Wednesday is day 469 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
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Source: IAR, PAP, press.un.org
Click on the audio player above for a report by Halyna Pastushuk.
