Ukrainian MPs call on international community to strengthen sanctions against Russia because of Syria
A group of deputies of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine called the international community to tighten sanctions on Russia because of its actions in Syria.
This group's stance was explained in the statement "regarding the criminal actions of the regime of the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Russia in Syria", published on the website of the Verkhovna Rada.
The statement was initiated by the First Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, Iryna Herashchenko, Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Foreign Affairs, Ganna Gopko, and Deputy Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on European Integration, Maria Ionova.
The group called on all sides involved in the conflict in Syria to immediately cease hostilities and called on the international community to strengthen sanctions against the Russian Federation as it is an accomplice to war crimes in Syria.
In addition, the group of deputies called on "international organizations, primarily the UN, the Arab League, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the progressive nations of the world to take all possible measures, to use all available instruments of influence over the main culprits of the protracted bloody terror, Damascus and Moscow, to force them fulfill their obligations under humanitarian law."
On December 21st the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution on the creation of an investigative body to assist in the investigation of war crimes committed in Syria since 2011.