Ukrainian students see peace hopes dim

Some at conference express U.N. doubts

NEW YORK — For nearly a week in April, Mariia Pachenko took a respite from her studies in besieged Ukraine to share its plight with fellow college students in New York. Soon after, the 18-year-old faced a decision: Return to her war-torn country or wait out the conflict as hopes for a diplomatic remedy dimmed by the day.

Pachenko and a handful of other Ukrainian students recounted the war’s human toll and the perilous trip through Russian-occupied territories to make it to the National Model United Nations conference, relishing the opportunity to foster “communication between young people across the world because it’s so important to share ideas, to express your thoughts on the relevant political issues and to try to find the solutions.”

But despite urgent calls to end the Russian invasion, diplomacy has made little progress in the real world.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has urged Moscow and Kyiv to take “whatever urgent steps” to stop the fighting, but the lack of dialogue between the two governments has been disconcerting for Pachenko — now in France for the foreseeable future — and her peers in the diaspora of Ukrainians fleeing bombs, tanks and violence.

They harbor little hope that diplomacy will prevail anytime soon.

“The United Nations as an organization needs to be reformed. It has no power — no practical power in the real world,” said participant Olha Tolmachova, who has returned to her town in western Ukraine, which has been spared the Russian onslaught.

Guterres spent nearly two hours in a one-on-one meeting Tuesday with Russian President Vladimir Putin, followed by a Thursday meeting with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

While the Russians rebuffed his appeal to halt fighting, the U.N. said Putin did agree in principle to the U.N. and the International Committee of the Red Cross’ participation in evacuating civilians from Mariupol.

Artemy Kalinovsky, a faculty member of Temple University’s Center for the Study of Force and Diplomacy, said they are rightfully skeptical.

The U.N. can highlight the ravages of war and serve as a platform for discussions, Kalinovsky said. But in the end, he said, “I don’t think there’s anything that the U.N. can do … because one of the belligerents or the aggressors in this case is a member of the Security Council and can veto anything that could serve to end this conflict.”

As the students’ conference was ongoing, the Kremlin withdrew from the U.N. Human Rights Council after the 193-member General Assembly — where there are no vetoes — voted to suspend Russia.

The war was not part of the Model U.N. conference’s central agenda, as it was planned many months beforehand. But the conflict wafted through as the Ukrainian delegation used the event as an informal podium.