Statement and right of reply by First Deputy Permanent Representative Dmitry Polyanskiy at UNSC briefing on the progress of resolution 2118 (Syrian chemical file)
Mr.President,
The Council convened to discuss the Syrian chemical file 10 days ago. Over this time, there have been no changes either on the ground or in the OPCW. The February report of OPCW Director-General that was presented today confirms this.
The fact that it was issued belatedly, in March instead of last days of February, cannot be interpreted as anything else but a formal reason to convene today. This is yet another proof that the current schedule of discussions of the Syrian file, in particular its chemical aspects, in the Council is inadequate. There is nothing to discuss this often, delegations just spout empty rhetoric. We repeatedly suggested amending this schedule, so that the Council could engage more effectively on this issue. The delegation of China also called to do this on numerous occasions. But Western colleagues did not support our proposals. We regret that “meeting for meetings’ sake” is more important to them than a meaningful discussion at the Council. Such an approach undermines the authority of this body.
In order to prove that our Western colleagues pay exaggerated attention to Syria, I suggest that we should look at what is happening in other hotspots. Take Libya. On 10 February the Libyan House of Representatives appointed Fathi Bashagha the new Prime Minister of the country, even though the incumbent head of Libya's interim Government of National Unity is Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh. There was an inauguration of the new prime minister. Shortly before that, two new ministers were kidnapped. As recently as in February there was an attempt on Abdul Dbeibeh’s life. In these circumstances, risks are growing that there may be duality of power in Libya and the situation in the country may further deteriorate, which may bring back an armed confrontation. However the penholders of the Libyan file in the Security Council pretend that there is nothing noteworthy happening. Despite this succession of alarming events, no one offered to change the schedule of our meetings on Libya which we now have once every two months. As for Syria, we discuss it at least twice a month only because this number of meetings is important to our Western colleagues. We think this is a brazen manifestation of double standards.
Mr.President,
As to the agenda of this briefing, our concerns with regard to the work of the OPCW at the Syrian track are well known. Since we are all gathered here, let me briefly repeat them. It is politicizing of the work of the OPCW, violations of the CWC-endorsed methods of work by the Technical Secretariat; established facts of manipulations in the FFM Douma report; the activity of the illegitimate Investigation and Identification Team that keeps churning out knowingly biased reports about the alleged guilt of Damascus; complete disregard for the facts of usage of chemical weapons by terrorists; and most importantly – total unwillingness of the OPCW to improve this deplorable situation. We spoke of it in detail less than two weeks ago and I see no point repeating this now. Again, we expect that Director-General of the OPCW will find some time in his allegedly busy schedule to brief the Council and respond to the questions that the delegation of Russia addressed to him. Otherwise we will have more reasons to suspect that the Technical Secretariat has something to hide.
Thank you, Mr.President, that was all I had to say today.
Right of reply:
Mr.President,
Colleagues,
Since some our Western colleagues touched upon an issue that does not relate to the topic of this meeting, namely Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine, I would like to respond. In particular, I will respond to what the representative of Albania and some others said about the situation in maternity hospital #1 in Mariupol, where casualties allegedly occurred after an attack by Russian aviation. Yesterday we circulated as an official UNSC document a letter by the Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation, where we underscored that during the Security Council meeting on 7 March, we had drawn attention to the fact this building had long been seized by the Azov battalion and turned into a military facility of Ukrainian nationalists. There have been no maternity patients for a long time already, which is proven by abundant evidence of eyewitnesses that is accessible on social media.
If you are going to further propel this issue, let me also say that the people of Mariupol (whom militants from the Azov battalion still hold as a human shield) analyzed the photos that were published on the Internet. They recognized the model that occurred in the pictures – her name is Marianna Podgurskaya. In those photos, she roleplays three pregnant women, wearing different makeup for each of the roles. That is why she can also be seen in other photos made by the same photographer, Evgeniy Maloletka, who covers the tragedy in Ukraine. He cooperates with Associated Press, New York Times, etc.
Colleagues, I do ask you to not spread fakes at the Security Council platform. The story of “White Helmets” was enough, you are not learning anything. So I do call you to take this meeting responsibly.
Thank you.
