STATEMENT

by H.E. Mr. Dr. Andrii Melnyk, LL.M.,

Ambassador, Permanent Representative of Ukraine

to the United Nations

at the Security Council meeting on

“Maintenance of peace and security of Ukraine”

(23 March 2026)

Mr. President,

Distinguished Members of the Security Council,

I wish to thank the U.S. Presidency for convening this meeting and Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau for chairing it.

It is a powerful signal that shows the importance that the US government attaches to Ukraine.

I am also grateful to the delegations of Denmark, France, Greece, Latvia, and the United Kingdom for supporting Ukraine’s request.

I am further thankful to the distinguished briefers, Under-Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo and Under-Secretary-General Tom Fletcher for their eye-opening and powerful presentations.

I have no doubt that — sooner than some may expect — all the shocking facts that we just heard from the UN Secretariat will serve as evidence of war crimes and crimes against humanity which Russia has been committing during its full-scale military invasion of Ukraine.

We commend the indispensable work of the UN institutions in Ukraine and call upon the member states to help finance the humanitarian needs; we all heard an appeal of UN Emergency Relief Coordinator USG Fletcher.

Mr. President,

Before I proceed with my statement, I want to briefly react to the baseless allegations of the representative of Russia about the supposed suffering of Russian people, even though he escaped the chamber.

Listening to all those fantasies one may get an impression that it is Ukraine that invaded poor Russia and not vice versa.

George Orwell would turn in his grave. As noted by USG DiCarlo, all these baseless claims of alleged Russian victims cannot be verified.

So my response to you is very simple:

прекратите ныть и лгать и просто убирайтесь из Украины.

Just stop whining and lying and get out of Ukraine.

Mr. President,

We are all closely following the disturbing developments in the Middle East.

Ukraine expresses its condolences to the victims of Iran’s missile and drone attacks against the countries in the region and deeply deplores these treacherous strikes.

That is why Ukraine became one of the first co-sponsors of SC Resolution 2817 adopted two weeks ago condemning these attacks against the Gulf countries and Jordan.

Moreover, our solidarity was not just words.

In the very first days, Ukraine sent hundreds of experts who are already on the ground helping our partners in the region to counter aerial threats and intercept deadly Iranian drones.

Mr. President,

Even though Russia did not dare to veto this resolution, what we have seen in the last weeks is that it is Moscow that has been providing substantial military support to the Tehran regime.

It is Russia that is not just the principal ally of Iran, but the main accomplice and co-perpetrator of unlawful attacks against civilian infrastructure of the Gulf states.

Russia has long portrayed itself as a “big friend” of the Global South opposing the “vicious” West.

But this narrative collapses under the weight of the real actions of Moscow helping Iran to ruin oil and gas production facilities in the region.

Russia does not care about the Global South. It has actually betrayed it.

The Kremlin is not just providing Tehran with intelligence support, including satellite imagery and other crucial data that facilitate targeting of US military assets across the Middle East.

There is, moreover, enough evidence that Russia is now transferring modernized Shahed-type drones to Iran, drawing on its own production capabilities based on licensed Iranian designs.

The same Shahed drones that Tehran was sending to Moscow since 2022 to murder Ukrainian civilians are now produced in Russia and sent back both to destroy oil and gas infrastructure as the backbone of the economy in the Gulf states, and to kill American soldiers.

This is an unprecedented escalation in the region that may cost countless lives.

Earlier this year, Russia reportedly transferred attack helicopters to Iran, in apparent violation of relevant UN arms restrictions.

But the massive provision of Russian drones to the Tehran regime elevates this conspiracy to a new level.

Mr. President,

This axis of evil between Moscow and Tehran constitutes an enormous threat to international security. Their military cooperation is truly alarming.

The United States and the international community must take this threat seriously and act before it is too late.

With those Russian drones, the Tehran regime will be capable of waging this war for a very long period, destabilizing not just the region, but the whole global economy.

This means that production sites of Russian drones should be considered legitimate targets for military strikes in the campaign against the Mullah regime.

Ukraine is already contributing to the weakening of the military potential of the Moscow–Tehran unholy alliance, as our troops are hitting these production facilities, exercising the right of self-defense.

So, providing Ukraine with the means for deep strikes and helping ramp up our domestic production of long-range missiles will support collective efforts to bring peace to the Middle East.

And my last point on Russia’s hidden role in destabilizing the whole region.

In reality, Russia is the primary beneficiary of the new wave of instability in the Middle East.

First, it automatically diverts global attention away from its ongoing aggression against Ukraine.

Second, the massive deployment of air defense systems is already creating shortages on the international market.

And third — and most critically — rising oil and gas prices are generating extraordinary windfall revenues for Russia.

Estimates suggest that in March alone, Russia may earn an additional 10 billion dollars from energy exports.

That is why we call upon our allies to impose additional sanctions on Russian oil and gas to deprive Moscow of these profits that fuel not only its war against Ukraine but also undermine global security and claim lives, including those of American servicemen.

Mr. President,

While the world’s attention shifts, we must not allow Russia’s war against Ukraine to be overshadowed and to fade into the background.

The recent conflict in Iran has revealed how intertwined this crisis is with Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine and the Kremlin’s malign imperialistic goals.

There shall be no illusion: this Russian war of annihilation against Ukrainian statehood continues with relentless brutality.

This winter was the deadliest for the civilian population since February 2022.

Over the last three months, Russia launched nearly 19,000 strike drones, more than 14,600 guided bombs and around 800 missiles.

Russia sought to plunge Ukraine into total blackout, to fully destroy critical infrastructure, and to break the resistance of our people.

But even though the suffering of civilians and the level of devastation are huge, Russia has failed to achieve this perfidious goal.

According to recent polls, Ukrainians do not even consider giving up.

I will translate it into the Russian language: «Не дождетесь». Don’t hold your breath.

Mr. President,

What we are witnessing is a carefully staged performance that Russia continues to play.

On the one hand, the war situation for the Kremlin is increasingly bleak on the battlefield.

And yet, Moscow keeps on puffing up its “greatness”, pretending to be invincible and projecting the image of being one step away from “total victory” and Ukraine’s supposed “capitulation”.

As the Institute for the Study of War, an independent think tank, rightly pointed out, Putin’s negotiating position is based on a bluff and a lie.

The bluff is that the Russians will overwhelm Ukraine and take what they want anyway.

The lie is that Putin will be satisfied with less than what he continually demands: namely, a de facto surrender of Ukraine.

This Russian claim of inevitability of its triumph is a myth — and I will briefly explain why.

Russia has failed to achieve any of the goals of its full-scale military invasion.

We are dealing with the longest 3-day blitzkrieg in human history, dragging on for over 4 years now.

Let us take a closer look at the situation on the front line.

Russian forces occupy 19.4 percent of Ukrainian territory.

They had taken about 7 percent during the first phase of the war in 2014 and came to occupy a total of 26.8 percent shortly after the full-scale invasion began in 2022.

Subsequent Ukrainian counteroffensives left the Russians holding only about 17.9 percent of Ukrainian soil in November 2022.

Since then, since autumn 2022, Russia has seized only 1.5 percent more Ukrainian land while suffering over 1,2 million casualties in total.

Just think about it for a moment:

Russian troops, the self-proclaimed second army in the world, have needed three and a half years to occupy 9,300 square kilometers, an area three times the size of Rhode Island.

Putin’s allegedly inexorable march to “victory” has been proceeding more slowly than a turtle’s pace.

At the current speed, it would take 183 years to occupy the whole territory of Ukraine. I repeat, Russia will need 183 years.

It doesn’t really sound like a successful blitzkrieg for Moscow, does it?

That is exactly the reason why Putin demands that Ukraine abandon, without a fight, territories in the Donetsk region that Moscow has failed to occupy over twelve years of its aggression.

By turning such ultimatums into preconditions for negotiations, what we observe now, Russia is deliberately obstructing the peace process.

That is one of the biggest stumbling blocks on the way to a peaceful resolution.

Russia has simultaneously invented other unresolvable dilemmas — both demanding that Ukraine hold elections as a condition for a final peace agreement while refusing the ceasefire needed for such elections.

Russia must stop playing these vicious games.

We call upon the United States as the only mediator to make clear to the Russians that these circus tricks, these theatrics are doomed to fail.

By the way, in the last months Ukrainian troops have broken the dynamics of war and begun to push Russian forces back in localized counterattacks.

In February alone, the Ukrainian army liberated a territory the combined size of Queens and Brooklyn in Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions.

So, from the military point of view, Russia is not winning the war. And it is an obvious fact.

The second reason why Putin is failing in Ukraine is because of the deteriorating economic situation in Russia that I described in detail when I was honored to speak before this Council last time in January.

This Monday, even Putin himself, with a visibly subdued expression, acknowledged the grave state of Russia’s economy. Just watch this video to see his long face. It is priceless.

Zero growth, zero reserves, increasing budget deficit and many other factors make it more and more difficult for Russia to finance the war against Ukraine and pay the salary to its soldiers.

The war in Iran and growing prices for oil and gas can, however, become a saving grace and a new lifeline for the Russian war machinery.

Putin will be clutching at straws trying to use this chaos in the Middle East as a game changer. We cannot allow it to happen.

Thus, we appeal to the United States to reintroduce sanctions against Russian energy resources as soon as possible and tighten the screws on Moscow.

We also call upon other member states who used to be the biggest buyers of Russian oil, gas and diesel to stop exporting them and stop filling Kremlin’s war chest and bankrolling its aggression.

Mr. President,

The only domain in which Russia is — regrettably — succeeding is in inflicting suffering on the Ukrainian people.

Every day, civilians are murdered both in areas near the front lines and deep within Ukraine as a result of daily drone and missile attacks. We have just heard the shocking figures of the number of victims during the briefing of USG DiCarlo. I will not repeat them, they still echo in our ears.

Russia is destroying critical infrastructure, targeting power and heat generation facilities, destroying water supply systems, and demolishing hospitals, schools, residential buildings, and businesses.

Thousands of Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilians are being illegally held by Russia in inhumane conditions subjected to systematic torture. They must be released without any conditions.

Tens of thousands of Ukrainian children have been abducted, deported, or forcibly transferred. They must return home immediately.

As indicated in the latest report of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Russia is also implementing policies in the occupied territories designed to destroy Ukrainian identity, force Ukrainians to leave their homes and make their return impossible. These are clear indications of the crime of genocide.

This medieval-era brutality must be stopped.

Mr. President,

Irrespective of all Russian tricks abusing diplomacy as a tool of delay — aimed at gambling on reduced international support for Kyiv — we remain fully committed to the restoration of peace.

Ukraine never was, and will never be, an obstacle to comprehensive, just, and lasting peace.

We will spare no effort to continue negotiations under U.S. leadership towards this goal.

Mr. President,

Before I wrap up, allow me to address one final point.

At our previous meeting, the representative of Russia once again recycled a familiar narrative about an alleged historical “unity” between Ukrainians and Russians.

He even muttered something about Kyivan Rus under his breath that we — Ukrainians — had sold for thirty pieces of silver.

Let me set the historical record straight once and for all.

In the beginning of the 12th century, Kyiv was the capital of the largest and one of the most powerful states in medieval Europe.

In those times, the area of present-day Moscow was nothing more than a swamp where only frogs were croaking.

It was in 1147 that a tiny settlement on the edge of the known political world was first mentioned that later would develop into Moscow.

It was under the powerful reign of the Grand Princes of Kyiv that Moscow was founded.

It was Andriy Boholubsky, the ruler of Vladimir-Suzdal, today’s Russia, whose troops plundered Kyiv in 1169, murdered its citizens and looted the city’s treasures with a ferocity reminiscent of the barbarian sackings of ancient Rome.

So, let us be honest: it was Moscow that betrayed Kyiv.

It is Moscow that continues the same brutal policy to this day, bombing Kyiv, destroying our golden-domed churches, raping and killing civilians.

Ukrainians do not need your distorted historical lessons about imagined “unity”.

It’s like the egg lecturing the chicken.

As the cradle of Ukrainian statehood, Kyiv has stood firm for more than a thousand years and it will stand for a thousand more.

It will flourish, it will remain unconquered, Russia will fail to subjugate it.

So, let me address you again in your own language that serves as a reminder of Russian colonial legacy:

«Закончен бал, потухли свечи. Бери шинель, иди домой».

The carnival is over – the candles are out. Take your trenchcoats and get out of Ukraine.

I thank you, Mr. President.

Photo credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elías