Increasing reports of sexual violence and human trafficking in Ukraine – allegedly committed against women and children in the context of massive displacement and the ongoing Russian invasion – are raising “all the red flags” about a potential protection crisis, the head of the UN’s gender agency warned the Security Council on Monday.
Sima Bahous, Executive Director of the UN gender equality and empowerment agency, UN Women, said reports of rape and other crimes are emerging as huge numbers of displaced Ukrainians continue fleeing their homes amid the presence of conscripted soldiers and mercenaries, and against the backdrop of brutal killings of civilians.
‘Gendered crisis’
Ms. Bahous recounted her recently-ended trip to the Republic of Moldova, where she witnessed buses full of anxious and exhausted women and children being met at the Ukrainian border by compassionate civil society workers.
As part of its coordination mandate, UN Women is supporting such groups “to ensure that the gendered nature of this crisis is addressed with a gender-sensitive response,” she said.
Condemning in the strongest terms an 8 April attack on a train station in Kramatorsk, which killed dozens of women and children waiting for evacuation from Ukraine, she also warned that “this trauma risks destroying a generation”.