Estonia: Chairmen of Foreign Affairs Committees call for stronger sanctions against Russia

NordenBladet — Today, Chairmen of Foreign Affairs Committees of seven countries made a joint statement calling for stronger sanctions against Russia and increasing support for Ukraine, as well as for suspending tourism and restricting the issue of entry visas to Russian citizens.

“As Chairs of Foreign Affairs Committees of our respective Parliaments, in response to the continued — unprovoked and unjust — war of aggression waged against Ukraine by the Russian Federation, we:

note the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, a sovereign country, is a gross violation of international law, including the UN Charter;

emphasise that since Russia’s unprovoked military attack on Ukraine on February 24, 2022, twelve million Ukrainians have been forced to flee their homes and over five million have been forced to flee their country;

refer to several reports by human rights groups and international monitoring missions about atrocities committed by the Russian armed forces against Ukrainian civilians, including torture, rape, murder and mass detention of civilians in so-called filtration centres, as well as mass deportations;

underline the immoral and illegal nature of the tactics chosen by Russia, the widespread use of especially cruel, imprecise weapons that maim and cause special suffering – Russia, by using this type of ammunition, violates international norms.  Russian forces in Ukraine are using internationally banned cluster munitions to sow fear and indiscriminately kill civilians;

stress that the deployment of Russian military personnel and weaponry at the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant – Europe’s largest nuclear power plant — is unacceptable and disregards the safety, security, and safeguards principles outlined in the Seven Pillars of Nuclear Safety and Security;

note that the presence of Russian military forces at the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant prevents the operator and the Ukrainian authorities from fulfilling their nuclear and radiation safety obligations per international conventions;

urge the Russian Federation to immediately withdraw its military forces and all other unauthorised personnel from the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant, its immediate surroundings, and all of Ukraine;

reiterate our strongest condemnation of the ongoing unprovoked and unjustifiable war of aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine. The Russian Federation must immediately withdraw its troops from within Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders and respect Ukraine’s territory and sovereignty;

call on the Euro-Atlantic community and its partners to urgently strengthen and implement comprehensive sanctions against the Russian Federation to stop the ability of the Russian army to continue its military aggression in Ukraine, to increase military, financial, humanitarian and diplomatic support to Ukraine, to unanimously support initiatives that condemn Russia’s military actions in Ukraine and calls bring the perpetrators to justice, isolate Russia from international and regional organisations, as well as adopt equivalent decisions and establish equivalent sanctions against Belarus as a supporter of Russian military aggression;

call on Member States of the European Union and other western allies to immediately suspend tourism and limit the issuance of entry visas for tourism of citizens of the Russian Federation;

commemorate all the victims of Russian aggression in Ukraine – thousands of civilians and defenders of Ukraine;

express solidarity with Ukraine and the Ukrainian people.”

The statement has been signed by the Chairmen of Foreign Affairs Committees of Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. On behalf of Estonia, it was signed by the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Riigikogu Marko Mihkelson.

Full text of the statement in Estonian, English, and Ukrainian.

 

 

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