General Assembly of the United Nations

ANDRZEJ DUDA, President of Poland, mentioned the further 3 million men and women in his place, which now has about 41 million men and women, are predominantly refugees from Ukraine.  Some are long lasting friends when other individuals travel concerning Poland and Ukraine.  The Russian Federation’s selection to wage this war was built by persons prompted by imperial sentiment and colonial, nationalist hubris, exalting their individual individuals and denying the proper to self-dedication to their sovereign neighbours.  “This war is not a regional conflict.  This war by the Russian Federation from Ukraine is a stoke of world wide fire.  This war will bear on our nations around the world and your nations.  Unless it has already transpired,” he claimed.

The food stuff disaster, alongside with the spectre of famine, is one particular of the most dramatic consequences of the Russian aggression, he claimed.  Leaders close to the globe are nervous about meals security and further limitations on the exports of grain and fertilizers from Ukraine and the Russia Federation, which has intentionally wrecked new crops and farming machines.  The invasion by itself has dramatically lowered Ukrainian harvests, with information indicating the Russian Federation has seized farmland making up 22 per cent of all agricultural land in Ukraine.  Conservative estimates show that in 2022 on your own, Ukraine’s harvest will be 35 per cent lesser.  “It is an economic weapon, it is weaponization of foods hitting the hardest Africa and the Center East,” he reported.  The quantity of folks suffering from serious starvation since the war started will boost by about 47 million.  The intercontinental community ought to assure the compliance of events to the 22 July agreements, signed in Istanbul, to permit the export of thousands and thousands of tons of Ukrainian grain by means of the Black Sea.

Poland, along with its European Union associates, stays steadfastly fully commited to making certain the exports of Ukrainian grain, together with by land.  A range of restrictions exist in worldwide regulation to guard foods means and the all-natural surroundings in the course of conflicts.  He cited the provisions of Article 11 of the Intercontinental Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which acknowledges the basic proper of everybody to be absolutely free from hunger, and in which States pledged to distribute the world’s food items supplies equitably.  In addition, Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions relating to the Safety of Victims of Intercontinental Armed Conflicts (8 June 1977), in Article 54, prohibits, among other points, attacking, destroying, eliminating or rendering ineffective objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian populace, these kinds of as foodstuffs and agricultural zones.  He believed penalization mechanisms must be designed to carry to justice the perpetrators responsible for violating intercontinental legislation.  “Those who knowingly demolish crops in the “breadbasket of the world” have to know that they will be pursued to be prosecuted as prolonged as they are living,” he stated.

Whilst the response to the difficulties on Ukraine are positive, complacency need to not be averted.  “This is how I see the lesson learnt from this war:  if the United Nations is genuinely to be united, each and every reaction to violations of international legislation should be identical, decisive and principled,” he claimed.  The environment is a procedure of communicating vessels.  “Today the sufferer is Ukraine, but if Russian imperialism succeeds — then tomorrow it could be any nation in the environment,” he included.

Poland recognizes just about every Condition inside of its internationally recognized borders and demands regard for their inviolability.  He explained the Russian Federation owes Ukraine war reparations.  It applies to any country plundering a different country and to unsettled concerns from the previous.  Poland shall not stop its efforts to hold the Russia Federation accountable for its violations of worldwide legislation, both at the Point out-degree as very well as on the particular person just one.  He recommended the Worldwide Law Commission’s perform to lead the drafting of the Convention on the prevention and punishment of crimes against humanity.  “We will use all our powers and capabilities to assure that the culprits are tried and punished.  We are now cooperating with the International Criminal Court and the Global Court of Justice to obtain the most productive ways to discover and prosecute the perpetrators,” he explained.