Tom Fletcher (OCHA): True Humanitarian Principles Must Apply to All
April 12, 2025
“If your principles apply only to your opponents, they are not humanitarian principles.” — Tom Fletcher, UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs.
It’s time to hold all violators of human rights accountable, regardless of who they are. Selective outrage perpetuates oppression. Stand consistently for justice.
#FreePalestine #HumanRights
English Script:
Tom Fletcher: What do we stand for anymore? My two asks today of the Security Council go beyond Ukraine alone. Under international humanitarian law that this council is here to defend parties to conflicts must protect civilians and civilian infrastructure. Even wars have rules. Is that not why we are here? And yet, on my visits from Ukraine to Gaza to Sudan to Lebanon to Myanmar, I’m seeing the opposite. That not only are we not standing robustly for international law, but in some cases we are supporting its debasement. If your principles apply only to your opponents, then they are not humanitarian principles. Please, you can do more to ensure that this era of increasingly belligerent, transactional self-defeating nationalism is not also remembered as one of callous impunity and brutal indifference in which the rights of civilians are discarded again and again with a shrug. My second ask, Mr. President, is, of course, for the funding to save lives in an increasingly dangerous environment. And this era of savage cuts, if you cannot stop the attacks on civilians in Ukraine and elsewhere. Please at least give us the security to operate and the resources we need to save as many survivors as we can.
