Vladimir Putin‘s lapdog at the United Nations appeared to mock Ukraine as it celebrated taking over the presidency of the Security Council this week in a sick display of insensitiveness.
Less than 24 hours after two people died in a devastating Russian missile strike on the Okhmatdyt children’s hospital in Kyiv, the Russian Federation’s representation served chicken Kyiv to guests at a special luncheon.
The distasteful stunt came right after an emergency meeting of the Security Council in which members discussed the Russian strike.
Ukraine‘s Permanent Representative to the Council, Sergiy Kyslytsya, raged at the decision in a brutal slap down.
Mr Kyslytsya said: “The moral degradation of Russian diplomacy is obvious.” He also argued the luncheon had been paid for with “blood money”.
Members of the Security Council heavily condemned the attack while the Russians denied any responsibility.
Putin’s envoy Vasily Nebenzya said: “If this was a Russian strike, there would have been nothing left of the building and all the children would have been killed and not wounded.”
Children at Okhmatdyt Hospital had to be evacuated to other facilities in Kyiv as multiple wards suffered heavy damage following the July 8 attack. Rescuers continued digging under the rubble well into July 9.
Russia assumed the presidency of the Security Council on July 1. Each member of the Council holds the presidency for a month on a rotational basis.
The strike on the children’s hospital was part of a massive daytime barrage in multiple cities, including the capital of Kyiv.
The attack also damaged Ukraine‘s main specialist hospital for women and hit key energy infrastructure.
At Okhmatdyt, “the ground shook and the walls trembled. Both children and adults screamed and cried from fear, and the wounded from pain,” cardiac surgeon and anesthesiologist Dr Volodymyr Zhovnir told the Security Council by video from Kyiv. “It was a real hell”.
Later, he heard people crying out for help from beneath the rubble. Most of the over 600 young patients had been moved to bomb shelters, except those in surgery, Zhovnir said.
He said over 300 people were injured, including eight children, and two adults died, one of them a young doctor.
Acting UN humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya stressed to the Security Council that intentionally attacking a hospital is a war crime.
She called Monday’s strikes “part of a deeply concerning pattern of systematic attacks harming health care and other civilian infrastructure across Ukraine”.