Russia, whose president is accused of war crimes, assumed charge of the UN Security Council on April 1, causing fury in Ukraine, the Reuters news agency reported.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video address late on Saturday: "Unfortunately, we ... have some obviously absurd and destructive news. Today, the terrorist state began to chair the UN Security Council."
He added, as quoted by his office: "Yesterday, the Russian army killed another Ukrainian child, a five-month-old boy ... Russian artillery ... one of the hundreds of artillery strikes that the terrorist state launches every day."
'Complete bankruptcy of such institutions'
Zelensky said: "And at the same time, Russia is chairing the UN Security Council. It is hard to imagine anything more evident that proves the complete bankruptcy of such institutions."
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba has said that Russia's presidency of the UN Security Council in April is "a bad joke" and that “the world can’t be a safe place” with Russia at the helm.
Each of the council's 15 members holds the presidency for a month on a rotating basis.
The last time Russia held the post was in February last year, when it launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
Sunday is day 403 of Russia's war on Ukraine.
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Source: IAR, PAP, BBC, Reuters, ukrinform.net, president.gov.ua
