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The writer, co-winner of the 2022 Nobel Prize for Peace, is a human rights lawyer, board member of the Institute for War & Peace Reporting, and heads the Center for Civil Liberties in Kyiv
I have some idea how Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy must have felt during those difficult moments in the Oval Office this past Friday, because I sometimes find myself in the absurd position of having to convince people that I, a Nobel Peace laureate, truly want peace.
Let’s be clear, the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine is horrible. For 11 years, I have documented the war’s cost. With the full-scale invasion three years ago, my organisation established a network of human rights defenders to record mass atrocities — from the dead on the streets in Bucha to the mass graves in Izium. Our database now underpins the prosecutor-general’s listing of more than 150,000 Russian war crimes.
I have spoken with hundreds of survivors of Russian captivity. They have recounted being beaten, raped, electrocuted and subjected to other unspeakable horrors. The suffering of Ukraine’s children is especially harrowing. Reprogramming children to reject their native language and culture is a genocidal tactic aimed at erasing a people by destroying its future. More than 20,000 children have been illegally abducted to Russia — an offence for which Vladimir Putin now faces charges at the International Criminal Court.
Two conclusions emerge. First, victims believe their tormentors commit these atrocities with impunity. Fully aware that Russian forces have meted out similar brutalities in Chechnya, Syria, Mali and elsewhere without punishment, these soldiers feel free to continue their crimes in Ukraine. Second, occupation is not peace — it is only the beginning of a new phase of suffering. In Russian-occupied territories, people live in a grey zone without the means to defend their rights, property or even their children. Under international law, occupation remains an armed conflict. Rather than alleviating the horrors, it merely renders them invisible.
Ukrainians want peace more than anyone else. But we demand real peace — a peace built on justice, freedom and sustainable security, one that assures us of our European future. We seek the freedom to live without the threat of renewed violence. This is the peace for which we have fought and suffered, died and survived.
As ceasefire negotiations continue above our heads, our greatest fear is that they will achieve nothing. Russia does not care whether there is war or peace — it seeks the destruction of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people. It will gleefully pocket every concession from the Trump administration and then continue fighting. There is a long record of Russia breaching ceasefire agreements with a new aggression. But a hybrid strategy is equally likely, including mobilising proxy political forces, infiltrating institutions, fomenting social chaos and investing heavily in propaganda to sap Ukrainian resolve while Russia re-arms.
Ukrainians are very grateful to the US and all who have supported us. Yet to forge a real peace, I call on our western partners to add the human dimension to these talks. Security guarantees are essential, mineral rights and conflict lines are important, but I am shocked by how little discussion there has been about people.
Incorporating a human dimension would, first and foremost, mean recognising that peace must have the basic consent of the Ukrainian population. It would mean releasing all Ukrainian prisoners held in Russian jails and returning all abducted children. It would also mean protecting the rights of all Ukrainians — even in occupied territories — by establishing international human rights monitoring within Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders. It would also entail securing reparations for victims using seized Russian assets to fund reconstruction, and to support both physical and psychological recovery, including compensation for the dead.
Critically, it would further mean backing comprehensive justice processes. Perpetrators must be held accountable for war crimes or the cycle will only continue. This should include increasing support for Ukraine’s national prosecutions and an international tribunal on the crime of aggression. If senior US politicians insist that the matter of who started the war is “complicated”, then let it be adjudicated.
Above all, it would mean an end to the shelling. If Trump is a man of peace, he can call for this today. On the eve of the third anniversary of the full-scale invasion, Russia unleashed more drones against Ukrainian cities in one night than ever before — directed mostly at civilian targets. Washington offered no criticism or comment. Ukrainians want peace, and the simplest path to this is for Russia to stop the killing.
