Mr. Prosecutor General,
Distinguished guests!
Ladies and gentlemen!
Honorable participants and guests of the "United for Justice" conference!
The word "justice" sounds different in various languages around the world, but it should be understood the same way everywhere, without confusion. Every nation recognizes how precious justice is. In any country that truly respects human life and international law, justice must prevail. I want to emphasize: in every country, regardless of how its national laws are written, what international treaties it has ratified, or whether the Rome Statute has come into force there. Justice unites people. And it does so because the pursuit of justice is fundamental to our shared human culture. Right now, this very pursuit of justice is what unites us and everyone working alongside us to protect lives and our country from Russia’s attacks. As of today, there are at least 137,000 reasons for us to continue this work and see it through. 137,000 – that is the number of war crimes committed by Russia so far – the ones we know about. Crimes against peace and humanity, against our state, against our people. Crimes against Ukraine and Ukrainians. 137,000. And that means there must be no fewer verdicts. Bucha, Yahidne, Mariupol, Olenivka – dozens of these horrific images, dozens of terrifying moments in Ukrainian cities and villages, hundreds and thousands of other places of Russian war crimes... There is probably no country that hasn’t heard of what the occupier has done on our land and against our people. And it must be ensured that in every country, they know the occupier will be held accountable for all of it. Because justice knows no borders. It should be equally valued everywhere – Europe, America, Asia, Africa, Australia. Everywhere human life and human dignity must be protected. There can be no exceptions to this in any country, and in particular, this applies to countries that can still be visited by the number one terrorist of the modern world, a war criminal and author of the brutal genocidal war that is currently being waged against Ukraine. The world has countless conventions, thousands of pages of declarations, and the Rome Statute functions, by the way, for over 100 countries around the world. The Rome Statute must work. But recently, an exception was made for Putin in Mongolia. And this is not just someone else's responsibility – it is the responsibility of the entire world to stop the degradation of the legal system, to prevent the destruction of the norms that still remain. The legal system must function in such a way that the Rome Statute, and particularly the warrant issued by the International Criminal Court against the top Russian criminal, genuinely restricts him and already ensures his isolation. I thank my colleagues, I thank Prosecutor Khan and his colleagues who have worked on this. I thank all of you. Because this is how societies respond to criminals – they isolate them. And this is how we must respond to Putin – by putting pressure on him, isolating him, and forcing him to end the war and seek peace. There are countries where the Rome Statute is in force, and there are countries that have not ratified the Rome Statute. These are global players. In a few months, the G20 Summit – a major event – will be held in Brazil. We’ve heard signals from the Brazilian government that they planned to invite Putin. But to make this happen, they would have to bypass the law, violate the legal system, and once again ignore the Rome Statute. Shouldn’t there be consequences for that?
Ladies and gentlemen!
Justice never comes about on its own from the words in laws or through ratification alone. Laws hold power when people act to protect the law, enforce the law, and uphold the power of the law. This is the essence of our cooperation – this is why we are united in the pursuit of justice. Each and every one of you who helps bring the Russian state, the Russian political and military leadership, and Russian war criminals to justice. Together, we must achieve one shared outcome – we in Ukraine, and all of us with our partners around the world: a sense that justice has prevailed, and that every person who suffered from this aggression knows that this evil did not go unpunished.
I want to thank all of you for today’s gathering. I thank everyone around the world who cares about justice. Thank you to everyone present.
Glory to Ukraine!