António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres, the Secretary-General of the UN, has confirmed that the World Body blacklisted the Russian and Israeli Armed Forces for their involvement in sexual violence in conflict zones. A 35-page Annual UN Report documenting sexual violence in conflicts worldwide recently included the Russian and Israeli forces on its blacklist for conflict-related sexual violence, in a rare first. The list also includes dozens of State and Non-state groups credibly suspected of having “systematically” engaged in sexual violence in Ukraine, Palestine, Sudan, Haiti, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Myanmar, Syria and Mali. It may be noted that Guterres had warned Israel and Russia of their possible inclusion on the list in August 2025.

The latest UN report has revealed that verified cases of conflict-related sexual violence more than doubled in 2025, with 9,788 incidents documented globally! It highlights the use of sexual violence, including rape, gang rape and sexual slavery, as a systematic tactic of war, torture and political repression across 21 countries.

The report has mentioned that the UN, in 2025, managed to document “patterns of sexual violence” against Palestinians detained in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, apart from verifying multiple incidents of conflict-related sexual violence, including as a form of torture, inflicted on 14 men, seven women, nine boys and a girl from Gaza and the West Bank. While 13 such cases took place in 2025, 18 occurred in 2023 and 2024. “Violations consisted of rape, including with objects, gang rape, attempted rape, physical violence to the genitals, instances of targeted shooting of the genitals, touching of breasts and genitals, strip and cavity searches conducted without apparent security justification, forced nudity and threats of rape,” added the report.

As expected, Israel has rejected the report, with Danny Danon, the Israeli Ambassador to the UN, stressing: “We are done with this UN Secretary-General. Guterres has put Israel on the same blacklist along with Hamas, ISIS and the most depraved terrorist organisations in the world.” He also said that Jerusalem had provided documents, data and detailed responses to the allegations raised in the report.

As far as Russia is concerned, the UN Report has stated that the concerned authorities in Moscow consistently denied access to UN Human Rights investigators. However, investigators were still able to verify 310 cases of conflict-related sexual violence against prisoners of war and civilian detainees in Russia and Russia-occupied areas of Ukraine. The vast majority of the victims were men, added the report. In Ukraine, Human Rights monitors documented 31 cases of conflict-related sexual violence against prisoners of war and civilian detainees, and the majority of those incidents occurred prior to 2025. However, the former Soviet Republic has not been put on the UN blacklist!

Talking to the media, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said: “We will write a letter to the Secretary-General, saying that these are unsubstantiated lies and alleged things which again portray Russia as a villain, like they do all the time.” He informed the press that the Kremlin was documenting and preparing a report on how the Ukrainians are treating Russian prisoners of war.

Meanwhile, Reem Alsalem, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women and Girls, has said that adding Israel to the blacklist for sexual violence is “long overdue”. She wrote on X: “This listing could not have come soon enough. I had in the past expressed my disappointment that Israel was not listed already, given the systematic, large-scale and horrific sexual violence perpetrated by Israel against Palestinian women, men and children that have been independently documented and verified.”

Meanwhile,

Boundless Ocean of Politics on Facebook

Boundless Ocean of Politics on Twitter

Boundless Ocean of Politics on Linkedin

Contact us: kousdas@gmail.com

Published by Koushik Das

Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das