AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL COVERS UP THE KREMLIN CRIMES

 

Activists from the Ukrainian community in Sweden, Stand With Ukraine Gothenburg, have analyzed the recent Amnesty International report, in which the Ukrainian army is accused of endangering civilians. 

“We express our outrage at this report and treat it as a direct attack on Ukrainian defenders, our brothers and sisters, who fight against a facist force,”  Gothenbug activists said. 

There is neither evaluation nor reflection in the report of all the crimes and atrocities committed by the russians in Ukraine. The concept of an aggressor and a victim has been put upside down. As Ukrainian minister of Foreign Affairs Dmytro Kuleba pointed out, the report establishes a false balance between the aggressor and the victim which is a distortion of the reality, justification of the aggressor’s crimes.

The only source of danger for the civilian population in Ukraine is russian occupiers that violated numerous international laws and agreements by invading Ukraine and waging a war of extermination. Russian soldiers have no right to be in any Ukrainian region nor they have the right to shell Ukrainian cities and villages.

The given report in particular and other materials from Amnesty International in general bear a distinctive feature – selective coverage of the events. There is no mentioning of terrorist missile attacks on Mykolayiv, Kremenchuk, Vinnytsia, Kyiv, Lviv and many other Ukrainian cities. There is almost no region left in Ukraine where russian missiles would not target. At the same time, for Amnesty International, the missile attacks did not seem to have happened. Underreporting of cluster munition usage and no mentioning of phosphorous bombs attacks is another feature of the organisation’s investigations. Sly comparison of both parties of the conflict by omitting facts, allows the aggressive Kremlin go unpunished with its crimes.

In the report, Amnesty International accuses the Armed Forces of Ukraine of inadequate protection of civilians, but only evidence is the testimonies from individual anonymous interviewees. Amnesty International fails to mention that Ukrainian authorities ask all civilians from the war zones to evacuate and Ukrainian Armed Forces assist in evacuation of the civilians to the extent possible. For instance, according to official data for April-May 2022, almost ¾ of the civilian population was evacuated from the Donetsk region. All who do not want or can not evacuate are warned about urban warfare that is approaching. Overall, the amount of people who left their homes during the time of the war including short time evacuation is about 14 million.

Amnesty International repeats Moscow's lie that the army does not protect Ukrainians. In contrast, the Ukrainian Army has the highest level of support among the population, 95 per cent, according to the surveys. Ukrainians consider the army as the highest guarantor of their independence.

The authors of the report also accuse the Armed Forces of Ukraine of using medical facilities as military bases. More systematic study than a selective survey of people was carried out by the Human Rights Centre "Alternative" which collected the facts of the destruction of medical facilities from February to the end of May 2022. According to the data, they recorded 65 incidents of Russian military shelling of health care facilities on the territory of Ukraine. At the same time, the organization did not find a single case of the presence of military personnel in these hospitals. The results of the work by the Human Rights Centre "Alternative" are consistent with the warfare tactics of russian army in Ichkeria, Georgia and Syria.

“Amnesty International turns a blind eye on the atrocities of the russian soldiers during occupation. Where are the reports on mass raping of women and children under russian occupation? Where are the reports of executions based on ethnic principle? Where are the reports about filtration camps for Ukrainians? Right at this moment, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe is mined and used by russians as a tool in the war. Why couldn't the investigators from Amnesty International access the site and report on the issue?”  the activists ask.

Two key areas that the organisation is responsible of are ending torture and protecting the rights of prisoners. Russian military by their own will post videos and photos of the mutilated bodies of Ukrainian POWs on the internet, flaunting and bragging about their actions. Even animals are not capable of the things these sadists do. Amnesty International stays silent. On the 29th of July, Ukrainians were shocked by the news about the mass execution of Ukrainian POWs in Olenivka. Amnesty International did not even give a press release.

The behavior of Amnesty International brings back to Ukrainians the memory of another tragic period of the past. In the 1930s many of the organisations, media and intellectuals of the Western Europe, who supposedly fought for rights of workers and farmers, supported Stalin’s regime. At a time when Ukrainian people were dying in artificially orchestrated famine by soviets in 1931-1933, the organisations and intellectuals praised Stalin and called information about the crimes a lie. Time passes, masks and clothes change, but what does not change is a desire of some organisations to serve the Kremlin.

Every day during five months of the war Ukrainian defenders fight in trenches and cities, on the water and in the air outnumbered to protect their loved ones, to save Ukraine and, for a moment, to save Europe. They actually do protect the organisations that cover them with mud, protect people who sit in their cosy offices and comfy chairs in Western countries and perform philosophical games with words. The only feeling a Ukrainian has while reading these type of “investigations” is disdain. 

“We,  Ukrainian community in Sweden, wholeheartedly grateful for the bravery and sacrifice of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and we will not allow moral bankrupts from Amnesty International supposedly protecting “human rights” to taint our defenders. The organisation that does not fulfil its statutory obligations, deceiving people fighting for freedom and existence, covering its actions with good deeds from the past has no moral right to exist. Ukrainian community in Sweden calls for the disbanding of Amnesty International starting with the dismissal of the leadership and an investigation of russian influence on the organisation. International community needs new organisations that would help protecting human rights and ease the pain of suffering people in practice,”  the activists said. 

Stand with Ukraine Gothenburg