LONDON — Ukraine’s First Lady Olena Zelenska, in her address to MPs in the UK Parliament on Tuesday, said the world community needs to unite to achieve justice for Ukraine.

In Westminster, Zelenska told MPs the world community needs to unite, just as it did in January 1942, to support a special tribunal against Russia’s aggression towards Ukraine.

“I’m asking you a small favor to become the world leader in the justice efforts,” she said. Justice is not just needed for Ukraine, but so that the world could lead its life not by the rule of force, she said.

“We need justice so that the world could survive,” Zelenska added. Zelenska received a standing ovation from those assembled at Westminster as her remarks concluded.

Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle spoke ahead of Zelenska at Westminster. He extended a warm welcome to the first lady, and said Parliament is “extremely privileged” to have her there.

Sir Lindsay spoke about the war in Ukraine and violence against women during conflict. He said we must not sleepwalk into thinking this situation is going on in a far-away land, and that it does not affect us.

He said the first lady’s visit must “shock us awake again”, and she “must make us listen” when she says women in Ukraine are being raped by Russian soldiers, and people’s lives are being destroyed.

“It is our duty to keep the spotlight on you, to keep shaking the world awake to the horrors Russia is committing,” he said, adding the UK needs to keep supporting Ukraine because “if Putin wins, other nations will be in his sights”.

Earlier, as part of her address after Sir Lindsay’s remarks, she showed MPs and peers pictures displaying the impact of Russian strikes.

And she told of the discoveries made by Ukraine forces in areas recaptured from Russian control — including what she described as torture rooms and what she said was the systematic abuse of children and elderly people.

She said Ukrainians are going through a terror similar to that experienced by the UK in World War Two, when Nazi Germany bombed cities in the blitz.

“Victory is not the only thing we need, we need justice,” Zelenska says, adding she “came to you for justice, because it will lead to the end of this war”.

She went on to say it would have been impossible for the people of bombed British cities to accept those responsible would not receive justice.

The Ukrainian people affected by Russia’s attacks deserve that same justice, Zelenska added. — BBC