Feb 24, 2022 will forever be recalled as the day when Russia started its brutal, unprovoked and illegal invasion of Ukraine. This was and remains a case of pure aggression and a clear-cut breach of the United Nations Charter.

This war is neither “just a European issue”, nor is it about the “West versus the rest”. It is about the kind of world we do not want to live in: no one is safe in a world where the illegal use of force – by a nuclear power and permanent member of the Security Council – would somehow be “normalised”. That is why international law must be enforced everywhere to protect everyone from power politics, blackmail and military attack.