Ukraine Takes Aim at 'Hypocritical' United Nations

Ukraine has used a meme of renowned musician Drake to condemn Russia's status as a permanent member on the United Nations Security Council.

On Thursday, the Centre for Strategic Communication and Information Security of Ukraine (SPRAVDI) tweeted "the U.N. is so hypocritical."

The tweet carried two images on top of each other of Drake in a practice known as "Drakeposting," in which still shots from the 2015 video of the Canadian hip hop artist's song "Hotline Bling" are set next to messages of disdain.

Along with the U.S., France, the U.K. and China, Russia's position as a permanent member gives it the power to veto Security Council resolutions. Kyiv has criticized Russia's place at the top table of diplomacy while it faces international condemnation for its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The first message in the meme read "kick Russia out of UNSC" and the other said "sue a Ukrainian who put a sticker on a car."

This referred to an image SPRAVDI also tweeted of U.N. cars in Kyiv upon which local resident Yosyp Husak had affixed placards which converted the logo to read "useless."

Husak carried out the actions after the destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam in the southern Kherson region on June 6, for which Kyiv has accused Russia of "ecocide."

"Yesterday in Ukraine, Russia caused the biggest man-made disaster of the last decades," Husak wrote next to images of the tagged cars. "Now, the following day, a few U.N. and WHO (World Health Organization) off-road vehicles are still in one of Kyiv's parking lots."

In a follow-up tweet, he criticized the sluggish response of the organization. "No vandalism, just expressing my position. Useless," he wrote, next to an image in which "seless" was added to the U on the U.N. vehicles.

Husak said on June 20 that he had received a court summons and had been charged with committing an act of minor hooliganism which Ukrainian outlets reported could result in a fine or up to two months of "correctional labor."

In April 2022, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the U.N. should act decisively against Russia after it was accused of atrocities in the town of Bucha, or "dissolve itself." He urged the Security Council to remove Russia "as an aggressor and a source of war so it cannot block decisions about its own aggression."

Kyiv was also angered when Russia took over the presidency of the Security Council in April. Meanwhile, Ukraine's U.N. representative Sergiy Kyslytsya said this month that it was "absurd" that the organization deployed humanitarian missions to Ukraine while Russia remained a permanent member.

Newsweek has contacted the U.N. for comment.