PACE designates Holodomor as genocide, asserts Ukraine only will determine path to peace
The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe adopted a resolution recognizing the Holodomor famine as genocide of the Ukrainian people and noted that peace negotiations in the war can only be held on Ukraine's terms, reported the head of the permanent delegation of Ukraine to the PACE, Servant of the People MP Maria Mezentseva.
According to the document, PACE will support Ukraine as long as it is needed, and achieving peace in the war means supporting Ukraine's victory in military, financial, political, diplomatic aspects.
The assembly recognized that any peace talks are possible only on Ukraine's terms, the Ukrainian lawmaker reports.
The document recognized the Peace Formula presented by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as the best peace plan to end Russia's war against Ukraine.
The PACE recognized the Holodomor as a crime of genocide as an intention to destroy the state of Ukraine, its language, culture and the organization honors the numerous victims, Mezentseva notes.
The resolution also states that the Russian Federation is trying to destroy the Ukrainian nation by means of a genocidal war.
In addition, the document noted the urgent need to reform the bodies of the United Nations, in which the Russian Federation illegally occupies a seat in the UN Security Council, Mezentseva reports.
What else PACE stated in the document:
→ supports the creation of the Register of Damages and the Compensation Mechanism – the establishment of compensation for each affected citizen;
→ demands immediate and unconditional release of victims of enforced disappearances, liquidation of infiltration camps and punishment of the guilty;
→ The Russian Federation should draw up a list of persons illegally detained as a result of aggression against Ukraine, to provide it to the UN or Ukraine or a third country that will ensure their return home;
→ development of a mechanism for the return of all Ukrainian children illegally deported to the Russian Federation and Belarus;
→ welcomes the holding of the Crimean Platform in Prague (October 2023);
→ supports the work of the Core Group of countries working on the creation of the Special international tribunal for the crime of aggression, including the International Center for Prosecution for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine (in The Hague);
→ does not recognize illegal referenda and "elections" in all temporarily occupied territories from 2014 to today;
→ does not recognize attempts at illegal annexation of Crimea and Sevastopol, parts of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhya oblasts.
On April 27, the PACE adopted a resolution stating that, according to the norms of international law, the forced deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia is a sign of genocide, therefore, all such cases should be investigated, and all those involved should be held accountable.
On July 26, Italy recognized the Holodomor as genocide of the Ukrainian people.
On September 12, the PACE Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights stated that the recent amendments to the Russian Constitution make it a "de facto dictatorship".