This latest Security Council meeting followed the session last Saturday during which a resolution declaring the planned referendum in Crimea invalid was vetoed by Russia.
Deputy UN Secretary General, Jan Eliasson, and UN Assistant Secretary General for Human Rights, Ivan Simonovic, briefed the Security Council on the latest developments in the Ukraine region, which they both had personally visited.
Mr. Eliasson warned that “the crisis has continued to deepen [and] tensions in Crimea and in eastern Ukraine continue to rise…we are now faced with risks of a dangerous further escalation that could have ramifications for international peace and security and have serious significance for this Council and for the United Nations.”
Summarizing the fast-moving events leading up to the decision by Russian President Vladimir Putin to honor the results of the Crimean referendum last Sunday in which 97% of those voting reportedly approved secession from Ukraine and absorption by the Russian Federation, Mr. Eliasson noted the subsequent fatal shooting of a Ukrainian soldier and the seizure of two Ukrainian naval bases by pro-Russian forces or unidentified groups. Ukraine has since announced that it plans to pull its troops out of Crimea, effectively bowing to the facts on the ground in which Russia has taken full control of the Crimean peninsula.
“It is clear that we are at a crossroads. If positions continue to harden and rhetoric continues to sharpen, there is great risk of a dangerous downward spiral,” Mr. Eliasson told the Security Council. “The focus must be to engage in direct dialogue between Moscow and Kiev aimed at agreeing on specific measures that will pave the way towards a diplomatic solution.”
Mr. Simonovic, the UN Assistant Secretary General for Human Rights, reported on his observations regarding the human rights situation in Ukraine, gleaned from talks with government officials in Kiev and discussions with victims of alleged human rights violations as well as civic leaders. He was not permitted by Crimean officials to visit Crimea. He noted gross human rights violations having been committed during the February protests in Kiev including sniper killing undertaken execution style. He urged the curbing of hate speech to prevent further incitement to violence. Responding to Russian allegations of widespread attacks and intimidation of Russian-speaking minorities in Crimea, which Russia used as a pretext for its military occupation and annexation of the peninsula, Mr. Simonovic acknowledged that there had been some scattered incidents of harassment but said they were neither widespread nor systematic.
When his turn came to speak, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin came out swinging. After hailing the “historic” occasion of Russian re-unification with Crimea to correct a serious “injustice,” he once again dismissed the legality of the new government in Kiev, which he said was run by racist, anti-Semitic xenophobes. That would be news, by the way, to the Chief Rabbi of Ukraine Rabbi Yaakov Dov Bleich, who said at a press briefing at UN headquarters in New York that charges of widespread anti-Semitism within the new government in Kiev were untrue.
Ambassador Churkin went on to accuse Mr. Simonovic of presenting a “one-sided” version of the human rights situation in Ukraine. He also claimed, without citing any evidence, that the killing of the Ukrainian soldier in Crimea was a “planned provocation” for which Russian forces bore no responsibility.
U.S. Ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, retorted: “The Representative of the Russian Federation began his intervention extolling the so-called referendum as embodying democratic procedures, and having been conducted without outside interference. Russia is known for its literary greatness - and what you just heard from the Russian Ambassador showed more imagination than Tolstoy or Chekhov. Russia has decided, it seems, to rewrite its borders, but it cannot rewrite the facts.”
Ambassador Power said that the crisis was never about protecting the rights of ethnic
Russians, as Russia had repeatedly claimed. Rather, it “was always about one country's ambition to redraw its own borders.” For good measure, Ambassador Power added: “A thief can steal property, but that does not confer the right of ownership on the thief.” She said the United States was prepared to take unspecified “additional steps if Russian aggression or Russian provocations continue.” The steps taken so far, light sanctions against a few individuals, have been treated by Russia as a complete joke.
In his brief rebuttal, Ambassador Churkin took umbrage at what he condemned as unacceptable “insults addressed to our country.” He said that such insults could jeopardize Russia’s willingness to cooperate with the United States on other diplomatic matters, presumably referring to negotiations with Iran over its nuclear enrichment program and the ongoing conflict in Syria. But Ambassador Power did not hear this warning. She had already left the Security Council chamber by the time Ambassador Churkin delivered his rebuttal.
President Obama has publicly ruled out any U.S. military action in Ukraine, a prudent decision but not one he needed to broadcast. That leaves ratcheting up economic sanctions and isolation against Russia, which would require, at minimum, concerted cooperation by America’s European and Asian allies to be effective.
Obama administration officials have warned that any military action that Russia brings against NATO members, which include the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, would be met with a firm response. The president himself said during the TV interview on March 19th, in which he announced his decision of no U.S. military intervention in Ukraine, "I think there’s a clear understanding that when it comes to our core interests or our NATO allies, we can protect ourselves." But he does not have to wait until Russia takes further aggressive actions that imperils those “core” interests or members of NATO to send clear signals of U.S. resolve. For example, he could decide immediately to install sophisticated military equipment such as missile defense systems in Poland, the Czech Republic, and perhaps the Baltic member states of NATO. He hasn’t done so.
Unfortunately, President Obama is spending too much of his time serving as lead insurance salesman for ObamaCare rather than focusing his attention where it belongs - on the deteriorating health of the world occurring under his watch.
