In different times our meeting today would be cause for celebration.

As many have said:

The OSCE was founded through the Budapest Declaration almost exactly thirty years ago.

And I quote: “Towards a genuine partnership in a new era” –

this was the hope, the hope that this Declaration would herald an era of dialogue, peace and cooperation.

And as my Ukrainian colleague pointed out, exactly 30 years ago today, in the Budapest Memorandum, Russia together with the US and the United Kingdom guaranteed the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine – in exchange for Ukraine giving up their nuclear weapons.

In 2014, when it first invaded Ukraine, Putin’s Russia broke this promise.

And for more than one thousand days now, Russia has not only been waging an illegal war of aggression against all of Ukraine, bringing untold suffering to millions of people, but also a war against this historical Budapest Declaration and its core principles on which the OSCE – our OSCE – is founded:

Respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of its participating States.

Respect for economic security – by attacking heat and power plants and not even shying away from threatening nuclear power plants.

Respect for human rights – by Russian abduction of Ukrainian children and by suppressing the rule of law and freedom of expression in the territories under its control and even in its own country.

By forcing thousands of its own young Russian men to fight not only a war, but to fight against their own future. By not even shying away from drawing others into this brutal war, like now Asia, by recruiting men from North Korea, obviously not through a free decision by these men.

The Secretary of State of the United States has made it very clear: this is not a coincidence, it has been planned for a long time.

And I want to be crystal clear, also now that we have heard this war rhetoric, these horrible lies again from the Russian Foreign Minister:

You can fool yourself, but you cannot fool the world: not 1.3 billion people in the OSCE region, who have one thing in common: wanting their families to live in peace.

You can fool yourself, but you cannot fool us, the 1.3 billion people in the OSCE region: we have all seen what happened in Bucha.

That you, your Government, Russia, sent soldiers to slaughter civilians in Bucha and in Irpin. Leaving their dead bodies unburied in the streets.

And I quote the horrible lie of the Russian Foreign Minister who called those victims, I quote, “TV actors”.

This is an outrageous lie which will convince no-one in this room.

I would therefore like to underline again:

I was in the small village of Jahidne a month ago, where I spoke to an old man who had been held captive for almost a month in the cramped basement of the local school under unspeakable conditions. Almost a month with more than 300 people, the elderly, babies, without light, without food. This has been the reality for 1000 days for villages under Russian occupation.

And this is why we all stood up more than two years ago, together, as diverse as we are. We do not agree on everything. Some of us do not agree on much but we do agree 100%, all 55 states here at the table, that peace, freedom and security is what is most important.

And this is why we have stood up together, in all our diversity, over the last two and a half years. Not only to defend our OSCE, which is standing up for these values every day in every corner of Europe.

But to keep this organisation alive and make it even stronger. Because of what is happening in Ukraine.

First and foremost, I would like to thank Helga Schmid, who has been Secretary General in this very difficult situation. She has shown what standing up for peace really means.

And I am immensely grateful also to you, Ian, for jumping in at such short notice to take on the OSCE Chairpersonship in the last year. This is also true European leadership.

It is also thanks to your unflagging mediation efforts that we were able to agree a package for the four top posts despite all the challenges this organisation faces.

With you, dear Maria, we have in this team a woman with exceptional experience in conflict solution and mediation. This also underscores the pivotal role of women when it comes to peace and security, especially at this time, when women’s rights are under attack in so many countries.

And maybe this also underlines something else: if you bring a woman on board in negotiations, then suddenly a package is possible, which maybe none of us might have thought possible 30 years ago.

We welcome that Greece and Turkey have shown great trust in each other – and we, too, have great trust in this team spirit.

I hope that this example might also inspire other countries within the OSCE, such as Armenia and Azerbaijan, to continue with this way of settling disputes.

Finally, I would like to underline that these times have also demonstrated that we need to keep reforming our own institutions.

We have seen not only in Moldova, but also in Georgia and Romania just recently, that fair elections must not only be fair on paper but we also need to look carefully at the digital space.

With the OSCE and its missions, we have an instrument at hand to react to these new challenges.

But we have to work on them intensively.

The representative of Georgia has just found clear words on Russia’s war against Ukraine, also with regard to interference in other countries, with regard to ongoing Russian occupation of parts of her country, Georgia.

We applaud the courage of people all over Georgia who are taking to the streets to defend democracy and European values.

And we call on the Government of Georgia to return to the European path – and here I disagree with the Georgian representative: it is the Government of Georgia that is deviating from this path in words and actions.

30 years after the agreements of Budapest, we do have reason to be optimistic.

After all, we know that with the OSCE, the EU and NATO our common security stands on a firm foundation.

It is up to us, each and every day, to defend what we want for the future of our children: to rally around democracy and freedom, because we know it makes us stronger, together.