The first launch of a rocket printed on a 3D printer failed

The US ambassador to the OSCE stated that the US believes that Russia committed war crimes in Ukraine and called on the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to use the organization’s capabilities to bring the perpetrators to justice.

During a speech before the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna on Wednesday, March 23, Ambassador Michael Carpenter recalled the latest report of the UN Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, which states that “the Russian authorities have committed a wide range of violations of international law in the field of human rights and international humanitarian law in different regions of Ukraine, many of which constitute war crimes.”

“The United States agrees that several categories of crimes committed by the Russian Federation in Ukraine do qualify as crimes against humanity. The evidence of such crimes is now cataloged by numerous NGOs, governments and international organizations, including, of course, the OSCE, and now also the UN,” the ambassador said.

The ambassador said that “the report of the UN commission of inquiry and the fact that the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova for their responsibility for the illegal transfer or deportation of Ukrainian children, which would be classified as war crimes, are not enough.”

“We must continue to highlight Russia’s barbaric actions,” Carpenter said.

He said that the OSCE should use the organization’s tools, such as the Moscow Mechanism, “to continue to expose and document the crimes of the Russian Federation in Ukraine – and there are many of them.”

According to the provisions of the OSCE, within the framework of the Moscow mechanism, which was approved in 1991, expert commissions are sent to member states to help them solve problems related to the protection of human rights.

As reported by Voice of America, the “Moscow mechanism” has been used several times since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

As part of the “Moscow Mechanism”, the methods of conducting war by Russia and fixing serious violations of international humanitarian law and violations of human rights in Ukraine were investigated, as well as an overview of the human rights situation in Russia itself was being prepared.

“We cannot remain silent” – Ambassador Carpenter

The ambassador emphasized that the US and the international community “cannot remain silent” about the crimes that Russia is committing in Ukraine.

Carpenter recalled a Human Rights Watch report that “documented what Russian Federation forces did last year in the small village of Yagidne,” in Donbas, where Russian forces rounded up 350 residents of the community, including 70 children, and herded them into the basement of a school . After a week, during which people were not released from the basement, “almost everyone fell ill” and “ten elderly prisoners died.”

According to Carpenter, when Russian officials talk about “denazification,” they need to be reminded of this report.

“The next time the Russian delegate here talks about denazification, remember Yagidne, remember it, every time he uses the term,” the ambassador said.

The US ambassador also recalled the attack on the station in Kramatorsk, on the drama theater in Mariupol, and numerous documented cases of torture and gender-based violence, “the known victims of which were women, men, boys and girls aged from four to 82 years old.”

According to the ambassador, the commission came to the conclusion that “such systematic torture may well be equated with crimes against humanity.”