Melnyk called for stripping Russia of permanent membership of the Security Council (Image: Bianca Otero/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock)
Ukraine has called on the UN to strip Russia of its Security Council member status, as officials describe the horrifying “human safaris” that Kremlin troops have been carrying out on civilians.
Andriy Melnyk, Ukraine’s Permanent Representative to the UN, asked member states to find a way to deprive Russia of its status as a permanent member of the Security Council as he detailed the atrocities carried out against Ukrainian civilians in recent months.
Speaking at the Security Council’s open debate on the protection of civilians in armed conflicts on Tuesday, Melnyk claimed that Russia’s aggression against Ukraine “stands out” among all the wars and conflicts in the world, “for the cruelty and systematic nature of the violence committed against the civilian population.”
He highlighted that figures from the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine show that the number of civilian casualties increased by 21% from January to April 2026, compared to the same period last year, Ukrinform reports. Civilian casualties have also risen by 93% compared to 2024.
A Russian missile attack on a Kyiv apartment building killed dozens of people last week (Image: Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images)
“The first four months of this year have been the deadliest period for Ukrainian civilians ever,” Melnyk said. He suggested that Russia has recently intensified its missile and drone barrages against civilians because it is not seeing success on the battlefield.
He noted that during winter, Russia systematically attacked Ukraine’s energy infrastructure in what he described as an attempt to “force millions of civilians to submit with cold.” The diplomat also revealed that Russia has been using “double-strike” tactics, which he explained is when an initial attack is followed by a second one “just to kill medical personnel and rescuers.”
He claimed Russian troops are carrying out “human safaris”, saying: “Russian drone operators are deliberately hunting and killing civilians on the streets, attacking ordinary people, ambulances, and humanitarian transport.”
He pointed out that the UN Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine had already deemed this practice as a crime against humanity. Melnyk said that Russian forces have created a “catastrophically intolerable situation” in the occupied territories of Ukraine.
“Arbitrary detentions…, torture, and enforced disappearances have become the main tools of Moscow’s illegal occupation policy,” he said.
He emphasized that more than 20,000 Ukrainian children have been illegally deported or forcibly displaced by Russia, and said that most of them are victims of “indoctrination, militarization, and attempts to erase their Ukrainian identity.”
“All legal obligations to protect civilians will ultimately remain empty words if acts of aggression and related war crimes are not punished,” Melnyk declared. He demanded that members of the Security Council and all UN member states “confront this grotesque reality” by finding a way to strip Russia of its permanent membership in the Security Council.
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