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”

(22 June 2026)

Madam President,

Distinguished Members of the Security Council,

Let me foremost thank the Colombian Presidency for convening this meeting and express my gratitude to the delegations of Denmark, France, Greece, Latvia, and the United Kingdom for supporting Ukraine’s request.

I am also grateful to the distinguished briefers, Assistant Secretary-General Khalid Yari and the OCHA Director Edem Wosornu, for their briefings and evidence of new war crimes committed by Russia against Ukraine and our civilian population, as well as against UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

ASG Khalid Yari has also mentioned that there were alleged casualties among the Russian population, and I must stress that all this data were not verified, thus reportedly is the crucial word in the briefing on this matter. And I call upon the Members of the Council to be cautious when Russia keeps inventing stories and figures.

And I would also like to briefly react to the statement of the OCHA Director Wosornu and some colleagues at this table, the delegation of Bahrain. I would like to underline that Ukraine and our Armed Forces respect international humanitarian law. It is a Bible for us, and our troops never, ever attack civilians.

We uphold the principle of distinction between the civilian and military objects. And since Russian oil refineries were mentioned today, I would like to say that an oil refinery that produces fuel for Russian tanks, Russian combat aircraft, and missile carriers is not a civilian object in the sense that Russian delegations and some colleagues are trying to impose.

It is a legitimate military target, and this is not our interpretation. It is the definition set out directly in International Humanitarian Law. Article 52, paragraph 2 of Additional Protocol 1 to the Geneva Conventions formulates this criterion unambiguously.

Military objectives are those which by their nature, location, purpose, or use make an effective contribution to military action and whose total or partial destruction, capture, or neutralization offers a definite military advantage.

So this definition has two elements, the contribution to military action and the military advantage from the strike. Russia's oil refineries satisfy these both criteria.

Madam President,

We are aware that it is already the sixth meeting devoted to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine within a month.

The reason for this intensity of our debates in this Hall is very simple. And it is definitely not Ukraine’s whim.

It is the unprecedented level of Russia’s missile terror against Ukrainian civilians that leaves our delegation no choice but to request these emergency meetings of the Security Council.

Yet every time we think that Russia has reached the very bottom of its brutality and can sink no lower in its cruelty, Mr. Putin shocks the world again and again by unveiling a new dimension of barbarity against Ukraine’s civilians and against our cultural heritage.

In the night of June 14 to June 15, 2026, the Russian Federation launched one of the largest combined aerial attacks against Ukraine with 70 missiles, and more than 600 drones.

The primary target of this brazen attack was our capital, Kyiv. Five people were killed and dozens injured, including children and a pregnant woman.

Few attacks throughout Russia’s war have caused such profound pain, for this strike was aimed at the very heart of Ukraine’s cultural and spiritual heritage.

Russia has once again crossed yet another red line in its relentless barbarism.

Russian armed forces deliberately targeted and damaged the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, an Orthodox monastery erected in the middle of the eleventh century, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1990.

It is not only one of the holiest shrines of Ukrainian Orthodoxy, but also one of the greatest spiritual and cultural treasures of all Christendom.

As a result of this treacherous attack by Russia, the Dormition Cathedral, originally built in 1078, was hit and sustained heavy destruction.

Moreover, Russian forces intentionally destroyed another sacred cultural landmark, the Dovzhenko Film Studio, founded in 1926, our Ukrainian Hollywood and a symbol of a century of Ukraine’s cinematic heritage.

This cynical strike resulted in the loss of Ukraine’s largest and oldest film costume collection.

This latest Russian attack also damaged Ukraine’s National Palace of Arts and the National Cultural, Art and Museum Complex “Mystetskyi Arsenal”, as well as the Kyiv National Karpenko-Kary Theatre.

In Kharkiv, Russia’s attack resulted in the killing of five emergency responders, and then one of them died in the hospital, in a so-called “double-tap” strike while they were extinguishing fires caused by a previous attack. Many other rescuers were injured. Civilian infrastructure, including cultural institutions such as the Kharkiv Art Museum, was severely damaged.

In Dnipro, Russian strikes damaged civilian infrastructure, including cultural facilities — the Hall of Organ and Chamber Music — while casualties and destruction were also reported. Other affected regions included Sumy, Zaporizhzhia, and Kyiv, where residential buildings and infrastructure were devastated.

Next day, on 16 June, Russia launched attacks involving more than 130 drones against multiple regions of Ukraine. At least three civilians were killed and dozens were injured.

Next day, on 17 June, Russia continued this wave of brutal attacks using more than 100 drones. Civilians were killed and dozens wounded in Sumy, Kharkiv, and Zaporizhzhia regions of Ukraine.

On 18 June, Russia carried out another large-scale aerial assault against Ukraine, deploying more than 200 attack drones and seven ballistic missiles. The attacks targeted Kyiv, Dnipro, Poltava, and other regions, killing and injuring civilians and causing further damage to civilian infrastructure.

Last Friday and during the weekend, Russia attacked Ukraine with almost 100 drones each single day. In every case, these drones were intentionally directed not at military objectives, but at innocent civilians across Ukraine.

On June 20, Russia killed five persons in Zaporizhzhia with a glide bomb; 13 more were injured.

This night, three civilian merchant vessels en route to Ukrainian ports were struck by Russian drones. This attack caused a fire aboard a vessel flying a flag of Panama, resulting in the death of a crew member, an Egyptian national.

Russian forces also attacked vessels flying the flags of Palau and Belize. Such strikes represent a direct threat to the freedom of navigation in the Black Sea and require a resolute response from the Security Council.

Madam President,

All these systematic and deliberate attacks against Ukraine and our civilian population by Russia constitute blatant and grave violations of international humanitarian law.

These actions amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity and must be condemned in the strongest possible terms and, finally, met with a decisive response from the United Nations Security Council.

Madam President,

Allow me to highlight, in a few brief points, the truly global significance of this most recent large-scale attack on the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, an outrageous assault that reaches far beyond Ukraine.

This monastery is one of the holiest sites of Christianity. Throughout its one-thousand-year history, the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra has survived foreign invasions and wars.

The Lavra has survived the Mongol-Tatar hordes that sacked Kyiv under the command of Khan Batu in the thirteenth century. It has survived the occupation of Nazi Germany during the Second World War. It has even survived Stalin’s religious persecution.

And now, in the 21st century, Russia, an impostor permanent member of this Council, struck at the very heart of this irreplaceable treasure of humankind, deliberately targeting the Dormition Cathedral, the principal church of the monastery complex, with a drone.

As a result of this treacherous attack by Russia , the Cathedral, inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List, sustained significant damage.

While the upper part of the Dormition Cathedral suffered the greatest impact from the fire, the threat also extended to the lower sections of the church, putting its historic murals, frescoes, and iconostasis at risk.

It is not only one of the holiest shrines of Ukrainian Orthodoxy, but also one of the greatest cultural treasures of the whole Christian world.

Madam President,

Today, on June 22, as we commemorate the 85th sad anniversary of Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union, we once again heard from the Russian representative a familiar mix of myths, distortions, and outright lies about the Second World War.

The irony is striking. It was during the retreat of the Red Army from Kyiv in 1941 that the Dormition Cathedral was blown up on orders from the Soviet leadership in Moscow.

The blame was then conveniently placed on the Nazi German occupation authorities. This was the official Soviet narrative that generations of us, me including, were taught in the Soviet school.

And today, eighty-five years later, we are once again hearing new falsehoods and new twisted narratives from Russia about memory of the Second World War.

Today, Russia presents itself as the principal victim of Nazi aggression against the USSR.

Yet only a tiny portion of Russia’s territory, less than 5 percent, experienced brutal occupation by the Third Reich.

Ukraine, by contrast, became the main battlefield of the war.

The whole of Ukraine was engulfed by the fighting, fully devastated first by the Nazi invasion and then by the brutal battles that accompanied the liberation of our soil from foreign occupation.

The Ukrainian people paid an immense and horrific price. Up to ten million Ukrainians lost their lives during the Second World War.

Ukraine’s land was subjected to devastation on a scale never seen before in history. Every Ukrainian family carries the memory of that tragedy.

That is why neither Russia nor anyone else has the right to monopolize the memory of the war, to appropriate the suffering of its victims, or to weaponize, as we see today in this Hall, history for political purposes of Moscow.

Madam President,

This reprehensible Russian strike against the Dormition Cathedral was not only a stab in the back for Ukrainians, it was a slap in the face of the entire civilized world.

Just imagine if Westminster Abbey in the United Kingdom had been deliberately struck by a drone.

Imagine if Notre-Dame de Paris had been targeted in an act of precision destruction.

Imagine if St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, America’s parish church, had been scarred.

Imagine if the Temple of Heaven in Beijing, one of the most sacred places not only for the Chinese people but for all humanity, had been hit in the same way.

Imagine if the Roskilde Cathedral in Denmark, the Riga Cathedral in Latvia, or the Parthenon and Meteora monasteries in Greece had been damaged in this way.

Imagine if the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore, Pakistan, one of the greatest monuments of Islamic civilization, had been attacked.

Imagine if the Basilica of Santa María la Antigua in Panama, the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary of Chiquinquirá in Colombia, the Cathedral Notre-Dame du Congo in Kinshasa, the Sacred Heart Cathedral in Monrovia, or the Fakr ad-Din Mosque in Mogadishu, in Somalia, had been reduced to ruins this way.

Madam President,

By authorizing a deliberate drone attack on the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, Mr. Putin has secured his place among the darkest figures of modern history.

His name will forever be associated not only with the destruction of cities and the killing of civilians, but also with the targeting of humanity’s cultural heritage.

These crimes will be remembered for generations, even long after this war has ended and justice has been served.

Driven by these imperial delusions, Mr. Putin has long sought to appropriate the historic legacy of Kyivan Rus, one of the most powerful medieval states in Europe centered in Kyiv, as well as such sacred landmarks as the Dormition Cathedral, in an attempt to anchor Russia’s statehood and spiritual identity in Kyiv’s history.

Yet by deliberately damaging the Cathedral, Mr. Putin has struck at the very foundations of this false narrative Russia claims to inherit.

He has driven a nail into the coffin of his own historical myth, the illusion of any legitimate connection to the spiritual heart of Ukraine’s Orthodoxy.

Madam President,

During the fateful night of June 15, Russia, as I have already mentioned, intentionally damaged another iconic cultural landmark, the Dovzhenko Film Studio, founded in 1926, it is our Hollywood and a symbol of a century of Ukrainian cinematic heritage.

The Dovzhenko Film Studio, established during the same golden age of filmmaking in the 1920s as other major film studios such as Warner Bros., The Walt Disney Company, and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, is one of the oldest film studios on the European continent.

For nearly 100 years, it has served as a cornerstone of Ukraine’s cultural life, producing more than 1,000 films, many of which received international acclaim, won prestigious awards, and became enduring classics of world cinema.

This brazen Russian missile strike resulted in the destruction of Ukraine’s largest and oldest film costume collection, representing an irreplaceable part of the nation’s cultural memory.

This goes far beyond physical damage: it is an attack on Ukraine’s cultural identity, artistic heritage, and the legacy of generations of filmmakers whose work has enriched global culture.

Madam President,

Imagine the world’s reaction if a ballistic missile strike were to destroy the historic collections of Pathé Film in France, Nordisk Film in Denmark, Universal Pictures in the United States, Ealing Studios in the United Kingdom, Riga Film Studio in Latvia, or Finos Film in Greece.

Imagine if a century of cinematic heritage, preserved through wars, political upheavals, and generations of artists, were suddenly reduced to ashes.

The outrage would be immediate. Governments would condemn it.

Yet this is precisely what Russia has done in Ukraine.

The Russian missile that struck the Dovzhenko Film Studio in Kyiv did not simply destroy a unique collection of film costumes. It obliterated irreplaceable artefacts that embodied one hundred years of Ukrainian cinema, and national identity.

Imagine if, in a single moment, the costumes and artefacts of global cinema — from Star Wars and Indiana Jones to the iconic legacy of James Bond — were destroyed in a deliberate strike.

From the cinematic traditions of China’s Changchun and Shanghai film studios and famous Pakistan’s Lahore studios, to Colombia’s vibrant audiovisual industry and the film heritage of Liberia, the world’s cultural treasures are not confined to Hollywood or Europe.

Imagine if, in the blink of an eye, the costumes worn by Chinese cinema icon Zhang Ziyi, or by Pakistan’s Lollywood star Shaan Shahid, were irreversibly destroyed as a result of a deliberate strike.

Buildings can be restored, and infrastructure can be rebuilt, but cultural artefacts are different. Once destroyed, they are gone forever. They are lost to humanity for all time.

And this is exactly what happened in Kyiv, on 15 June, as the Dovzhenko Film Studio was reduced to ashes. Russia must be punished for this act of barbarism.

Madam President,

Before I conclude, I cannot help but turn the attention of the distinguished Council to the recent report of the Secretary-General on children and armed conflict.

Russia has been blacklisted for four consecutive years as a UN Member State whose armed forces systematically commit war crimes against Ukrainian children, including killing, maiming, and the destruction of schools and hospitals.

Since 2023, the number of children killed and maimed by Russian forces has increased by 78 percent. Attacks on schools and hospitals attributed to the Russian army have nearly doubled. Incidents of denial of humanitarian access have increased by more than 800 percent.

The Russian armed forces have secured a place on the Secretary-General’s “list of shame” for grave violations against children in armed conflict, alongside terrorist organizations such as ISIS/Da’esh, Al-Qaida, the Taliban and Hamas, entities widely recognized among the most barbaric in human history.

So, Russia belongs to an exclusive club of murderers of children and perpetrators of conflict-related sexual violence.

May I ask you, distinguished members of the Council, whether you feel comfortable sitting at the same table with a Member State whose armed forces are responsible for verified widespread and systematic war crimes against children, as well as crimes of conflict-related sexual violence?

I do not. It makes me shudder with disgust.

Russian military and security personnel shall be banned from UN peacekeeping operations.

Madam President,

Over the past months, Ukraine has fundamentally changed the dynamics of Russia’s war.

Even Russian military bloggers are openly admitting that Moscow cannot win it.

The boomerang of war unleashed by Mr. Putin has returned to Russian territory, and for the first time Russians are feeling the dark breath of his war.

Almost 40 percent of Russia’s oil refineries have been damaged and can no longer support its military campaign.

Recent days have shown that even the air defense shield built around Moscow, reinforced with all the systems pulled from across Russia, is failing to protect its military targets.

This is just the beginning.

Over the past fifteen months, Ukraine has repeatedly called on the Security Council to adopt a resolution for a full and unconditional ceasefire.

Unfortunately, Ukraine’s outstretched hand has remained hanging in the air.

Ukraine stands ready to engage in direct negotiations with Russia to secure a just and lasting peace in accordance with the UN Charter. But our patience is not endless. If the Security Council would further choose a “wait-and-see” approach, I cannot exclude that Ukraine may recalibrate and modify its offer. Ceasefire along the de-facto frontline is already a great compromise.

So, addressing the Russian representative, I can give you one advice. You will never be able to hold the occupied lands. Never.

Get out of Ukraine, as quickly as possible before it is too late.

I thank you.

 

RIGHT OF REPLY

Thank you, Madam President.

Just a very short reaction. I would like to reject and discard this flow of lies that we have just heard from the Russian representative trying to justify the war of aggression. Not a single word that we heard corresponds to the truth.

It seems that even the Russian representative herself does not believe in all the lies that she had to spread in this Council.

We just heard a fairy tale that everything in Russia is just perfect and wonderful and beautiful, the economy is flourishing, the armed forces are heroically advancing, and the military operation is conducted according to a plan.

However, the reality on the ground is exactly the opposite. Since half a year, Russian troops have stuck along the front line. Russia is losing over 30,000 soldiers every single month. Double as many as the Soviet Union has lost during the ten years war against Afghanistan.

The Russian population started panicking because suddenly the consequences of this war that Mr. Putin has unleashed are reaching Moscow, St. Petersburg, and other cities.

So it reminds us of a famous French song “Tout va très bien, Madame la Marquise”.

“А в остальном, прекрасная маркиза, всё хорошо, всё хорошо.”

I don't think that this message, even if you proclaim it a thousand times here at the Council, will be comforting to the Russian population, starting to see the face, the ugly face of war.

I thank you, Madam President.