‘He’s a spokesperson for the Devil’: Ukraine’s ambassador on facing Russia at the UN

On the evening of 23 February, as nearly 200,000 Russian troops were massed at the border with Ukraine, the United Nations Security Council called an emergency meeting to address an apparently imminent invasion.

By the time Ukraine’s ambassador, Sergiy Kyslytsya, began to speak to the chamber, the war had already begun. The 52-year-old diplomat put aside his prepared speech and spoke directly to his Russian counterpart, Vasily Nebenzya, urging him to call his superiors in the Kremlin and tell them to stop the aggression against Ukraine.

“There is no purgatory for war criminals. They go straight to hell, ambassador,” he concluded.

Looking back on that moment now, four months into the war, Mr Kyslytsya has no regrets about the language he used.