The UN’s human rights chief condemned Russia’s attack on Ukraine on Thursday, warning that the world’s nuclear threat levels have increased, putting all of mankind at risk.
Michelle Bachelet warned the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which began a week ago, is having a tremendous impact on the human rights of millions of people across Ukraine.
Her remarks occurred during an urgent council debate on the Ukraine war, which came after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the nuclear forces of Russia to be placed on high alert on Sunday.
Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has before accused Western politicians of being fixated with nuclear war.
Moscow possesses the world’s greatest nuclear arsenal as well as a sizable stockpile of ballistic missiles, which serve as the backbone of its deterrence capabilities.
Bachelet’s address came as UN estimates revealed that Ukraine’s tragic week-long battle had already displaced over one million people into neighboring countries, with countless others displaced within the war-torn country.
Bachelet said her administration had counted 227 civilian casualties, with at least 15 children among them, but that the true figure was likely much higher.
At least 70 Ukrainian servicemen were killed as Russian forces attacked a military station in Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine.
In Kyiv, a firefighter retrieves a hose amid the rubble of a residential apartment block damaged by a missile.
After the Lugansk People’s Republic took control of the town of Schastye, a patrol walks through a burned-out building.
