Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba posted a video of his speech on Instagram.
Kuleba addressed the audience and stressed that he wanted them to hear the voices of Ukrainian children who survived occupation and suffering.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba read out excerpts from the real war diaries of three Ukrainian children who lived in Russian occupation:
Eight-year-old Yehor Kravtsov. 3 March 2022, besieged Mariupol:
"I slept well; I woke up, smiled and counted to 25. Also, my grandfather died. I have a wound on my back, the skin is torn out, my sister has a head injury, my mother has the meat on her arm torn out and a hole in her leg."
The next day: "My birthday is coming up. I lost two dogs and my grandmother Galia. And my beloved city of Mariupol."
Violetta Horbacheva, 13 years old. She spent about four months in occupied Nova Kakhovka.
February 2022: "We do not leave the house. I'm just afraid that if I come out of the entrance, I'll be shot. The streets are almost empty. My father goes to work and brings food. The village is being shelled because of the hydroelectric power station. I write to my friend from there, but he does not answer. I wonder how many of my friends might die...".
May 2022: "My mother says not to walk where there are no people because many girls are raped. On 27 May, the connection was cut off completely. People stood like zombies near a closed cafe, where there was some local internet."
Arina Pervunna, 11 years old. She was hiding in a basement in an occupied village.
"She was afraid that the Russian military might rape her, so she called her father, who was in government-controlled territory, crying and asking him to take her away. To save his child, he somehow managed to come and get her, but on the way back, Russian soldiers opened fire on the car and killed Arina's father in front of her," Kuleba says.
A week later, Arina wrote in her diary: "I don't want to live. What is this life without my dad for? I'm still a clumsy child who can't do anything on her own, but this is probably my punishment, probably for not keeping quiet but calling my dad, being impatient. If I hadn't called my dad, everything would have been fine, everyone would have been alive. I hate myself. Why am I so helpless?"
26 May 2023: "Dad, I just finished seventh grade and I have really good grades. I love you very much. I will do everything to make you proud of me. I love you, Daddy."
"I am sure that many of the delegates in the UNGA hall have children. They would never want their children to go through such hell. No child in the world, not in Ukraine or any other country in the world, deserves to go through this. No political goal can justify a child's tears," Kuleba wrote on Instagram.
On July 18, Kuleba also called on UN members to join the G7 declaration on security guarantees for Ukraine.