MOSCOW, June 2 (RIA Novosti) – Russian ombudsman Pavel Astakhov has called on his colleagues with the European Network of Ombudspersons for Children (ENOC) to protect kids trapped in southeastern Ukraine’s Luhansk and Donetsk, according to his official webpage.
“Astakhov pointed to grave violations of children’s rights that take place under the Ukrainian regime with regard to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the 1949 Geneva Convention and their protocols, and urged his colleagues in Europe to support measures aimed at relieving the plight of the civilian population and create humanitarian corridors to allow the safe transit of children and families with children from combat zones,” the announcement said.
The statement cited a social movement in Slaviansk, in the north of Donetsk, as saying the Ukrainian army’s shelling operation had entered a new phase, with intensified fire and sweeping “cleansings” reported across the region.
According to Astakhov’s webpage, the NGO called Slaviansk Assembly of Luhanshchina urged international community to help them pull children, including orphans, from the territory and give them refuge away from the war zone.
The ENOC is a not-for-profit association of independent children's rights institutions. Its mandate is to facilitate the promotion and protection of the rights of children, as stipulated in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
