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Parliamentary Update – October 10-17, 2022

War Crime Watch

After launching 83 missiles on Ukraine on October 10, russia continued to shell multiple Ukrainian cities on the next day.

According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, on October 11, russian forces launched 29 missiles, delivered 13 air attacks, and carried out shelling from multiple launch rocket systems more than 40 times. The infrastructure of more than 40 settlements, including large cities, towns, and villages, was damaged. The city of Lviv experienced a partial blackout, and Zaporizhzhia alone withstood 12 missile strikes.

russians also used 14 Shahed-136 drones to attack the critical infrastructure in Odesa and Mykolaiv regions.

Over the week of October 10-16, Ukraine’s infrastructure withstood about 130 russia’s attacks.

According to Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal, maintenance departments had to restore power supply in 4,000 Ukrainian settlements.

A 6-year-old child suffered a traumatic amputation of her legs as a result of the shelling of Nikopol by russians.

The russian forces attacked the town in the Dnipropetrovsk region on October 12, gravely injuring three civilians, among whom was a little girl. All the victims of the shelling were taken to the hospital in serious condition, and the child now requires surgical intervention and prosthetics.

Nuclear disaster is approaching — Energoatom chief.

In an interview with ZDF, President of Energoatom Petro Kotin stated that the situation at the temporarily occupied Zaporizhzhia NPP “is getting worse with every week that the occupiers are present on the site,” as russians had already mined the plant, damaged one of the reactor buildings and the plant’s sixth block.

They had also spontaneously caused the NPP blocks to enter cooldown mode, leaving the cooling of reactors dependent solely on the external power supply sources — connection with which, according to Mr. Kotin, was lost due to russians’ damaging the wiring. The ZNPP employees sometimes had to use diesel generators, which made the situation comparable to that of the Fukushima accident at its early stages.

Besides that, russian occupiers are torturing and kidnapping the plant employees, with the most recent case having been confirmed on October 10, when the russian forces took Valerii Martyniuk, Deputy Director General of ZNPP, to an unknown destination. This increases the likelihood of human error, which can also lead to disaster.

Kyiv was attacked by Shahed-136 drones on October 17.

The drones hit critical infrastructure facilities and damaged a residential building, taking the lives of 5 civilians. Among those killed was an expecting couple.

Reactions from the World’s Parliaments

VRU Deputy Speaker discussed aid to Ukraine with EP President.

Deputy Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Olena Kondratiuk took part in the meeting of women speakers of parliaments of the EU in Brussels on October 12. There, she met with President of the European Parliament Roberta Metsola.

Ms. Kondratiuk thanked the EP President for her efforts and leadership in advocating for the provision of modern weapons to Ukraine, as well as the assistance to Ukrainian refugees sheltered by the EU. The two parliamentarians discussed Ukraine’s need in further weaponry supplies and the prosecution of russian war criminals in the International Court of Justice. Finally, Ms. Kondratiuk asked Ms. Metsola to help promote the official recognition of russia as a terrorist state by the EU Member States’ parliaments.

The current russian regime is a terrorist one — PACE.

On October 13, following the russian missile attacks on Ukrainian cities of October 10-11, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe unanimously adopted a resolution titled Further Escalation in the russian federation's Aggression against Ukraine.

The document states that russia’s “aggression must be unequivocally condemned as a crime, as a violation of international law and as a major threat to international peace and security" and calls on the CoE Member States to exert a policy of maximum pressure on russia, support Ukraine financially and militarily (namely by providing air defense systems), and declare the current russian regime as a terrorist one.

The resolution also challenges russia’s seat in the UN Security Council, noting that “threats [of nuclear warfare] are in breach of international law and incompatible with the responsibilities of a nuclear power holding a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council.”

IPU Assembly called for an end to russian occupation of Ukraine.

On October 14, the 145th Inter-Parliamentary Union Assembly in Kigali, Rwanda adopted a resolution on Ukraine entitled Condemnation of the invasion of Ukraine and of the subsequent annexation of territories, in defense of the territorial integrity of all States.

The resolution calls for “an immediate end to the russian military occupation of sovereign Ukrainian territory, restoring its territorial integrity back to its internationally recognized borders, extending to its territorial waters, and consequently the rule of international law”. It supports “the resolutions of various international bodies to investigate and prosecute the perpetrators of possible war crimes committed in Ukraine” as well as the creation of courts with specific jurisdiction to investigate them.

The resolution also reaffirms support for the ongoing work of the IPU Task Force for the peaceful resolution of the war in Ukraine.

MEP urges Ukraine’s western partners to send fighter jets to intercept russian cruise missiles.

As reported by Ukrinform, Member of the European Parliament from Poland Beata Kempa stated, “I believe that Western aircraft should be supplied to Ukraine to counter russian cruise missiles. We must provide any assistance, by all means, to preempt future attacks from russia.”

Parliamentary News

Ukraine’s delegation, led by Oleksandr Kornienko, VRU's First Deputy Speaker, ensured the adoption of the resolution at the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU).

The IPU Assembly, which is being held this week in Kigali, Rwanda, adopted an emergency resolution titled Condemning the invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent annexation of territories to protect the territorial integrity of the entire state. Besides that, the IPU considered issues of protecting Ukraine’s territorial integrity, the world food crisis, supporting Ukraine at the United Nations General Assembly, students exchange and the latest technologies.

Oleksandr Kornienko stressed the importance of the participation of European and world leaders in the First Parliamentary Summit of the Crimean Platform, which will take place on October 25 in Zagreb, Croatia.

Program News

For 31 weeks, USAID RADA: Next Generation Program has been assisting Ukraine’s Parliament in its external communication within the Communication Task Force of the VRU Secretariat,

mainly through narrative development and info production for social media, both in English and Ukraine daily.

Program arranged a meeting with the ex-head of the Georgian Parliamentary Research Service (PRS) to help newly established Ukraine’s PRS learn the main challenges in launching the PRS.

During the meeting on October 12, participants agreed to continue cooperation and PRS (Ukraine) had already sent the request for information to the PRS (Georgia) regarding their legislation on national minorities.

Program assisted the VRU Parliamentary Education Center in holding an online lesson for 150 high-school students

within the series of sessions “Parliaments of the World Stand with Ukraine about the US assistance to Ukraine, US government system.

Program assisted the VRU’s Committee on Social Policy and Protection of Veterans' Rights in arranging the expert round table

dediacted to “Social protection, provision of specific statuses to Defenders of Ukraine and their family members, family members of deceased Defenders of Ukraine”.

Participants discussed registered draft laws that deal with the status of Defenders of Ukraine, as well as financial payouts to members of their families. The meeting gathered MPs, government, veterans NGOs, spouses of deceased Defenders of Ukraine and experts.

Program experts emphasized the parliamentary control strengthening at the working group of parliamentary reform that deals with the issues of the Parliament-Government interaction.

On October 11, USAID RADA Next Generation experts participated in the meeting of the working group's unit that deals with the issues of the Parliament-Government interaction. USAID RADA: Next Generation experts discussed the draft Concept of the legislative process issues and parliamentary control strengthening.

Program upcoming events

On October 18-20, USAID RADA Next Generation will hold an updated training on Public policy analysis

upon a request from the VRU Secretariat.

On October 20-21, Program will conduct training on European integration

in cooperation with the Association4U Project (with the support of the EU delegation in Ukraine) for the first group of the newly created sub-committees for EU integration in the VRU.