00:00And for a look at the human toll of this gruesome war, I now have the pleasure of welcoming Aleksandra
00:04Modvichuk. She's the founder of the Ukrainian Center for Civil Liberties and the 2022 Nobel
00:09Peace Prize laureate. Aleksandra, thank you so much for joining us on DW today. Before we talk
00:15about the work you and the Center for Civil Liberties do, I want to ask you a personal
00:19question. How did your life change on February 24th of 2022? Everything which I call normal life
00:27was ruined in one moment. For me and for millions of people in Ukraine, because to live during
00:34the large-scale war, it means that you live in total uncertainty. You can't plan not just
00:39your day, you can't plan your next several hours. You have no ideas what will happen. To
00:44live during the large-scale war means that such simple things as meeting with your friends
00:51in the cafe or to hug your beloved ones or to have family dinners disappeared and crushed
00:58in hundreds of pieces. Yeah. Now, a lot of the reporting on the war is focused on the frontline.
01:05But I want to know from you, because you have a very special vision of how it affects the rest
01:10of the country. How has Ukraine changed? How have Ukrainians changed in these past four years?
01:16It's a forced winter of large-scale war and it's very difficult, because Russians deliberately
01:21destroyed energy grid, the very infrastructure that civilians depends on their survival. So,
01:28people in Ukraine are literally freezing in their flats without heat, water and electricity. But don't give
01:37up. When looking at how this war has been covered, how would you say outside reporters and foreign analysts,
01:49what have they been getting wrong about Ukrainians and all of this?
01:53I think one of the main problem is that we lose human dimension of this war in political process. When
02:03we look what politicians discussed in this frame of peace talk, which was initiated by President Trump,
02:11we see that politicians discussed natural minerals, Russia's territorial claims, geopolitical interests,
02:18but they don't speak about people. They speak about territories like empty spaces. I'm sorry, it's not empty spaces.
02:28Millions of Ukrainians live there. They live in grey zone. They have no tool how to defend their right,
02:35their freedom, their property, their life, their children, their beloved ones. And Russian occupation,
02:40it's not just changing one state flag to another. Russian occupation means enforced disappearances, torture,
02:48rape, denial of your identity, forcible adoption of your own children, filtration camps and mass graves. And I think
02:55it's a huge problem that we lose human dimension in these political negotiations.
03:02You're a human rights lawyer and you once said that impunity is the engine of this war. How are you
03:08and
03:08your organization working to end that impunity? We are documenting war crimes. We have in our database
03:15more than 98,000 episodes. It's a huge amount, but still just a tip of iceberg. Because all this hell,
03:24which we face in Ukraine, it's a result of total impunity, which Russia enjoyed for decades, committing
03:30horrible crimes in Chechnya, in Moldova, in Georgia, in Mali, in Libya, in Syria, in other countries of the
03:38world. Russians have never been punished. They believe they can do whatever they want.
03:45Are you confident that Vladimir Putin will ever have to respond for the crimes he has had committed?
03:53We are working on it. We are working on it. We are working on it. I'm not naive. I know
03:59that
04:00there is no guarantees in our life, but we have chance. And it's a huge luxury to have chance. And
04:08we plan to
04:08yield this chance. What has it been like for you to see your country not only under constant attack,
04:16but also bear witness to all these horrific crimes throughout the past four years?
04:25It's not easy because first we are human beings and then we are professional human rights lawyers.
04:31And we are documenting not just violations of Geneva and her conventions. We are documenting human pain.
04:39And when you work with human pain on a daily basis,
04:44in some periods you have this feeling that this pain burned you out.
04:50How do you keep going? What's your motivation? What drives you to keep going day after day, you and your
04:57team?
04:59People inspires me. We face this enormous cruelty for one side, but from another side with enormous solidarity.
05:10And I don't wish any nation to go through the war, because war is the most horrible thing,
05:18which just can happen in the human life. But I witness how these dramatic times provide people in Ukraine
05:25the opportunity to express the best in us. These dramatic times literally test us for true courage,
05:34true leadership and true responsibility. And I think that Ukrainians are passing this test with dignity.
05:42They are very much indeed. And their dignity has impressed the world ever since the full-scale invasion
05:47started. Now there are efforts underway to bring this war to an end diplomatically.
05:54There are these three-way talks with the US, Russia and Ukraine at the table. I'd like to get your
06:00opinion. What do you make of them? I think we have to define the goal properly. The goal is not
06:07just to
06:08sign the formal peace treaty. Because let me remind, in 2014, when Russia invaded Ukraine and occupied Crimea
06:16and part of eastern regions, Ukraine had a zero chance to release these territories. And Ukraine signed two
06:24peace agreements with Russia. And Russia violates them both. So there is no need to have the third Minsk,
06:31the third peace agreement, which Russia will violate in future. The question is how to make Putin to stop this
06:39war.
06:40Then my question is how? Have you lost faith in diplomacy then?
06:45I think that diplomacy must be strengthened by decisive actions. Because our task is to make for Putin the
06:53price for war higher than the price for peace. Because now war is profitable for him. It provides excuses for
07:02a lot of
07:02internal problems. It's centralized power. And he dreams about his legacy. His logic is historical.
07:10He wants to forcibly restore Russian empire. And because human life is the cheapest resource in Russian
07:17state, Putin still doesn't refuse from his goal.
07:21Yeah. We have to wrap up. But I don't want to let you go without asking you, what gives you
07:27hope at a moment
07:29like this and throughout the past four years?
07:32I think we have to define the hope in a proper way. Because hope, it's not a confidence that everything
07:41will be fine. Hope is a deep understanding that all our efforts have meaning.
07:49Alexandra Madrichuk, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and Human Rights Lawyer, thank you so much for all the
07:54great work you've done and for taking the time to speaking to DW today. All the best to you.
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