Joint statement by the EU Delegation and five EU member states*
JUNE 3 marked the 100th day of the war in Ukraine. Russia’s unprovoked war against Ukraine is a horror for Ukraine and its people. It has killed tens of thousands of civilians, traumatised millions and reduced entire cities to rubble. This devastating human rights and humanitarian crisis has resulted in the exile of more than 6.5 million Ukrainians abroad and the displacement of an additional 7.7 million people within Ukraine.
The flagrant breach of the United Nations Charter also endangers the entire rules-based international order. Threats to the territorial integrity and independence of any state are a threat to us all. We have a common responsibility to maintain peace and stability and a safe and sustainable world, and to react to the massive and blatant violations of human rights, international humanitarian law, and to the allegations of crimes in Ukraine falling under the jurisdiction of the ICC on a daily basis.
Nations around the world stand united in condemning Russia’s invasion and expressing solidarity with the Ukrainian people. Three UN General Assembly resolutions, adopted with the overwhelming support of the UN’s member states, have shown that international law and the multilateral rules-based order matter, and that attacks against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state will not be tolerated.
The Kremlin is also conducting a systematic disinformation campaign to falsify reality and hide the extent of its abuses, both internationally and among its own population by cutting them off from access to free and independent information. The only authorised media in Russia are at the service of the government and are used by Moscow as weapons of war and mind manipulation.
However, there is another dimension to Putin’s war that affects people in all parts of the world. Every day it becomes more obvious that it is also aggravating the world's economy, as well as food and energy security. Countries that have been struggling to recover from the covid19 pandemic now face further challenges to food and nutrition security, energy, commodity prices and public finances.
Contrary to Russia’s disinformation, these impacts are not due to the international sanctions targeting the Russian government and Russia’s financial sector and economic elites to reduce the Kremlin’s ability to finance the unjustified aggression.
These impacts are the responsibility of Russia, and wholly avoidable. This is a man-made crisis and the name of the man is Putin. His threats and actions prove that he is using food (like energy) as a geopolitical weapon – disregarding the lives and well-being of people – in Russia, Ukraine, anywhere. Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council and ex-president of Russia, has said and thereby admitted that food exports are his country’s “silent weapon.”
The Russian military is deliberately targeting the Ukrainian agricultural sector. It is estimated that 49 per cent of winter wheat
