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‘A Crime Against Democracy Itself’: Zelenskyy Condemns Russia for Abducting Mayor

Above: Photo Collage / Lynxotic

“They have moved to a new stage of terror in which they are trying to physically eliminate representatives of legitimate local Ukrainian authorities,” said the Ukrainian president.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday accused Russia of committing “a crime against democracy itself” by abducting the mayor of Melitopol, a city in southern Ukraine that Russian troops seized in the early days of the invasion.

“This is obviously a sign of weakness of the invaders,” Zelenskyy said during a press conference, praising Melitopol Mayor Ivan Federov as someone “who bravely defends Ukraine and the members of his community.”

Russian forces, Zelenskyy warned, have “moved to a new stage of terror in which they are trying to physically eliminate representatives of legitimate local Ukrainian authorities.”

“The capture of the mayor of Melitopol is, therefore, a crime, not only against a particular person, against a particular community, and not only against Ukraine,” he continued. “It is a crime against democracy itself.”

According to Ukrainian officials, Russian soldiers “put a plastic bag” on Fedorov’s head and abducted him from the Melitopol city center on Friday, outraging local residents who turned out to protest the alleged kidnapping.

“Return the mayor!” townspeople shouted during a demonstration on Saturday. “Free the mayor!”

The New York Times reported that “nearly as soon as people gathered, the Russians moved to shut them down, arresting a woman who they said had organized the demonstration, according to two witnesses and the woman’s Facebook account.”

Across Europe on Saturday, thousands of people took to the streets to protest Russia’s deadly assault on Ukraine, which shows no sign of abating after entering its third week.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron both spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin by phone on Saturday, urging him to broker an immediate ceasefire and move toward a diplomatic resolution in Ukraine—but there was no indication that Putin was prepared to heed their demands.

“The conversation is part of ongoing international efforts to end the war in Ukraine,” a spokesperson for the German government said in a statement.

The Elysée, meanwhile, described the phone conversation with Putin as “very frank and difficult.”

The call came as Ukrainian officials braced for a potentially massive Russian assault on the capital city of Kyiv, which has thus far fought off Russia’s incursion attempts. The Associated Press reported that fighting “raged in the outskirts of the capital” as Russian forces continued bombarding and shelling other Ukrainian cities, including the strategic port of Mariupol.

“In Irpin, a suburb northwest of Kyiv, bodies lay out in the open Saturday on streets and in a park,” according to AP.

The U.K. Ministry of Defence has assessed that “the bulk of Russian ground forces” are now roughly 25 kilometers from the center of Kyiv. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Zelenskyy, declared Friday that Kyiv is “ready to fight.”

Zelenskyy himself said Saturday that “if there are hundreds of thousands of people, who are now being mobilized by Russia, and they come with hundreds or thousands of tanks, they will take Kyiv.”

“We understand that,” he continued. “How Ukrainian people have resisted these invaders has already gone down in history. But we have no right to reduce the intensity of defense, no matter how difficult it may be for us.”

Originally published on Common Dreams by JAKE JOHNSON and republished under a  Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

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Russia Condemned for Alleged Use of Cluster Bombs in Ukraine

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Above: Photo Collage Lynxotic / Various

There must be “an immediate halt to use of the internationally banned weapon,” said the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and Cluster Munition Coalition.

Allegations on Friday that Russian forces have used cluster munitions in its ongoing assault on Ukraine elicited sharp condemnation Friday from critics of the indiscriminate weapons.

The International Campaign to Ban Landmines and Cluster Munition Coalition (ICBL-CMC) expressed alarm in a statement about “the threat of further harm to civilians including humanitarian mine action partners.”

“We call for an immediate halt to use of the internationally banned weapon, and urge all parties to guarantee protection of civilians, respect for international humanitarian law, and the international norm banning use of cluster munitions and landmines,” the group said.

One hundred twenty-three nations have joined the Convention on Cluster Munitions, committing states to ban the use, production, stockpiling, or transfer of the weapons, which disperse bomblets over a widespread area and pose lasting threats as unexploded fragments become de facto landmines.

The international treaty also obligates signatories to destroy their stockpiles of the weapons. Neither Ukraine, Russia, nor the United States are signatories to the international treaty.

ICBL-CMC’s statement came after the New York Timesreported Thursday that remnants left by a likely Russian strike near a hospital in the eastern Ukrainian city of Vuhledar “suggest the possible use of cluster munitions.”

The Times referenced a tweet by Mark Hiznay, associate arms director at Human Rights Watch, in which he shared photos from the Ukraine Weapons Tracker account purportedly showing the aftermath of the attack:

The Washington Post also reported Thursday that “as it encircled Ukraine in recent weeks, the Russian military brought forward an array of aircraft capable of firing guided air-to-ground missiles or dropping ‘dumb’ munitions such as cluster or fragmentation bombs.”

Further evidence suggesting Russia has used the pernicious weapons came Friday from independent and open source investigative outlet Bellingcat, which shared in Twitter posts photos of a cluster munition canister in the eastern Ukraine city of Okhtyrka and said the canister’s location just a short distance from a school means it “may be connected” to an alleged attack on a local kindergarten.

Russia’s alleged attack on a kindgergarten as well as an orphanage in Okhtyrka prompted Ukraine to call for a war crimes investigation.

In a Friday tweet, Ukraine’s Foreign Affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote: “Today’s Russian attacks on a kindergarten and an orphanage are war crimes and violations of the Rome Statute. Together with the general prosecutor’s office we are collecting this and other facts, which we will immediately send to the Hague. Responsibility is inevitable.”

Human rights groups have expressed concern about harm to civilians, including through the potential use of cluster munition, since Russia began its invasion of Ukraine on Thursday.

Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General, accused the Russian military of having displayed “a blatant disregard for civilian lives by using ballistic missiles and other explosive weapons with wide area effects in densely populated areas.”

“Some of these attacks may be war crimes,” she said in a Friday statement. “The Russian government, which falsely claims to use only precision-guided weapons, should take responsibility for these acts.”

Advocacy group CIVIC also lamented Friday that “the number of civilian casualties in Ukraine is rising” and called on “warring actors” to “avoid using weapons that result in indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civilian objects.”

“Some of these weapons,” the group said, “include unguided munitions, multiple launch rocket systems, banned cluster munitions, and other explosive weapons with wide-area effect.”

Originally published on Common Dreams by ANDREA GERMANOSand republished under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

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