SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Iraq supports diplomatic efforts to end the war in Ukraine, the country’s foreign minister said on Saturday.
Minister Fuad Hussein discussed the latest developments of the Ukrainian and Russian war with British ambassador to Iraq Mark Bryson-Richardson, according to the official Iraqi news agency (INA).
“Iraq supports intensifying diplomatic efforts to reach a political solution, end military operations, work for calm and restraint, and respect the principles of international law and the United Nations Charter as well as the sovereignty of states on their territories,” Hussein said.
Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on February 24. The ensuing fighting has killed thousands of people, devastated parts of cities and caused millions of Ukrainians to flee their homes, according to the United Nations.
British intelligence warned that Russia was not pursuing a strategy of attrition that could intensify the humanitarian crisis.
Russian forces have taken heavy losses and their advance has largely stalled since President Vladimir Putin launched the assault, with long columns of troops that bore down on Kyiv halted in the suburbs, according to Reuters.
But they have laid siege to cities, blasting urban areas to rubble, and in recent days have intensified missile attacks on scattered targets in western Ukraine, away from the main battlefields.
The U.N. human rights office said that at least 847 civilians had been killed and 1,399 wounded in Ukraine as of Friday, with the real figure likely much higher, Reuters reported.
The Ukrainian prosecutor general’s office said that 112 children were among the dead.
More than 3.3 million refugees have fled Ukraine through its western border, with around 2 more million displaced inside the country. Ukraine has evacuated 190,000 civilians from frontline areas via humanitarian corridors, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said on Saturday.
