The Security Council is chaired by Russia. In a broadcast of the meeting, Sergiy Kyslytsya, Ukraine’s ambassador to the U.N., could be heard demanding Russia relinquish its duties as council chair, imploring: “Call Putin. Call [Russian foreign minister Sergey] Lavrov to stop aggression.”

U.S. ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield also lamented that Putin had “ordered that last step.”

“As we are gathered in the council seeking peace, Putin delivered a message of war in total disdain for the responsibility of the council,” she said. “The council will need to act and we will put a resolution on the table tomorrow.”

As the meeting ended, Ukraine’s Kyslytsya told the Russian envoy: “There is no purgatory for war criminals. They go straight to hell, ambassador.