Statement by Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzia at the UN Security Council Meeting on Syria
Mr. President,
We are grateful to UNICEF Executive Director Ms. Fore, and Assistant Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Ms. Mueller, for their statements. Ms. Mueller has indeed done a great job, especially with regard to covering so-called "forgotten crises", and in general, she demonstrated talent and principled approach as a humanitarian. Thank you for your work.
Mr. President,
Since meetings of the Council take place regularly - perhaps even too regularly - many of SC members, I imagine, can already write statements for each other. We for example knew in advance what our colleagues from the P3 and humanitarian penholders would say. We have heard these messages more than once. Our colleagues can probably imagine our comments and remarks - though they usually prefer to ignore them. It's easier that way.
But I suggest that we change a bit a standard format of the meeting and, instead of wrangling, focus on two recent reports of the Secretary-General – the first one is on alternatives to the modalities for the border crossing of Al Yarubiyah, previously closed pursuant to the decision of the Council; and another one is on humanitarian situation in Syria.
These reports raise many issues, about which we together with our UN colleagues have expressed our concern. Among these issues is the humanitarian situation in Idlib. We are convinced that this is not a normal situation, when in the zone of a large-scale humanitarian operation with a budget of hundreds of millions of dollars people have to sleep in the open for several days, even weeks. We believe that it was possible to predict such developments and get prepared for the situation, especially given the threats associated with the winter period. The Turkish side is not creating any obstacle to humanitarian deliveries to Idlib, and humanitarian organization are not constrained in resources either. So why hasn’t this problem been solved so far?
Furthermore, from reports of humanitarian NGOs we know that among the temporarily displaced people there are those who died from the heaters catching fire in temporary tents. Those are the causes, rather than freezing as many colleagues have tried to present, that led to the most of casualties. We believe that humanitarians and the companies supplying these devices should react, so that such incidents can be avoided in the future.
Now let's get back to the Secretary General's reports. At previous meetings, colleagues from other delegations often criticized us, telling that the Russian position is allegedly never backed up by facts and that we stand almost alone in the Council. So today, there is an excellent opportunity to provide you the facts.
The first point. As we have noted, the only lasting solution for Idlib and, frankly speaking, for Syria as a whole, is a final and irreversible expulsion from that country of all terrorists. Please don’t tell us that we are exaggerating the problem and don’t try to whitewash Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham.
The Secretary General’s report (S/2020/141) clearly explains, who some members of the Council are trying to flirt with - I quote the document: "killings, abductions, detainments, torture, public executions of civilians, journalists, social activists and health workers, bans on public assemblies and not allowing civilians to enter safe zones". This is paragraph 15.
As for the issue of the ratio of civilians to fighters – well, even if there are not very many fighters, as you claim, they are still capable of perpetrating their atrocities across the entire province. The number does not really matter; therefore, we do not accept this argument.
The second point. At every meeting we are told that Damascus is unwilling to cooperate. The goal is clear - to create an illusion that there is no progress with humanitarian access, and thus to make a well-worn conclusion that it is not possible to reach agreement with the Syrian Government. Even today, we have heard similar statements. In the meantime, the Syrian Government have increased the number of approvals for humanitarian operations up to 600 per month. All UN agencies and 28 international NGOs are registered and working in the country. This is also mentrioned in the report (para. 38).
Moreover, the "lion's share" of the abovementioned approvals - to be more precise, 95 per cent - are so-called "blanket approvals", which give to humanitarian actors more flexibility compared to other forms of approvals. In principle, they do not restrict the number of humanitarian missions in the authorized areas, and therefore that kind of approval is particularly valued by the humanitarian community. And over the last two months, I would repeat once again, over the last two month the Syrian side has issued 1,1193 of such blanket approvals (para. 32), with 4.4 million people covered. In just two months. Also, I would like to remind you that according to paragraph 31 of the report, there are 1,700 UN staff members in the country - and these are only staff members of the UN, not mentioning local staff and the staff of humanitarian organizations, number of these people is even larger. So they were granted visas, weren’t they? These people are working in Syria. However, these facts are ignored. We get the impression that some of our colleagues simply do not read reports of the Secretary-General.
We are not trying to say that there are no problems. There are problems, and the report does mention that. We are simply asking not to paint everything in black and white, not to remain silent about the reverse side of the coin and not to increase political pressure where it is not necessary. And don’t rush to bury the Astana Format.
As many other countries, we are working with the Syrian side to resolve existing difficulties. However, the country is waging war against terrorists, a number of natural resources have been cut off, production chains have been broken, and illegal unilateral sanctions undermine the effectiveness of the Government. Active terrorist cells are operating in the country, and they do not shun to use the humanitarian factor in their dirty information- and armed campaigns.
This also applies to reports about the bombings of schools and hospitals. There's no UN presence in Idlib. And to confirm these bombings it’s enough to make basically two phone calls. We've often exposed fakes based on such reliable information. Today our American colleagues talked about the bombings against camps for internally displaced persons. As stated in Ms. Muller's report, there has been only one reported bombing of IDP camp - Camp in Dana - and that was not a bombing but an artillery shelling. Express yourself more clearly, please.
We have already reviewed relevant examples at our September press briefing.
Third point. Since the Secretary General's report on the modalities for the border crossing of Al Yarubiyah has been published, let us introduce some clarity and give an alternative point of view. With references, of course, to the text of the report.
Let me remind you that the whole information campaign defending this border crossing pursued one goal – not to allow any changes in the cross-border mechanism. Since it has always been presented as a legal precedent in the context of international humanitarian law, year after year our colleagues has defended it to remain unaltered. We understood these arguments. However, we did not share them.
Arguments specifically on ‘Al Yarubiyah’, let me remind you, was based on two points: the first one - "there is no alternative to ‘Al Yarubiyah’, the second one - "It’s possible to reach the north-east of Syria from Damascus only through Iraq". All other options were considered as nonsense, including the Russian and Syrian proposals.
Let us now look at another report (s/2020/139). The first fact – except some medical supplies, all cargoes - I repeat – all cargoes including food, equipment, hygiene products - were shipped to the Euphrates area from within Syria, not from Iraq (paras. 12, 13 and 41 of the report). And they are still being delivered - on February 18, a UNFPA convoy passed from Damascus to Kamyshly, (para. 40). Earlier WFP covered the same route.
The next point is about the argument that there are no alternatives to ‘Al Yarubiyah’. The entire final part of the report specifically outlines these very alternatives, and the main and most feasible one is to receive approval from Damascus for an only type of humanitarian cargo that is not covered by regular deliveries from within Syria. Namely medical supplies.
At the previous meeting, I showed you a Syrian note to the UN Resident Coordinator with an approval to deliver a cargo that has been delayed in Iraq, through the southern border crossing. Damascus issued that approval in one day. It was not possible, though, to carry out delivery due to security reasons. We understand that.
Yesterday, the Government gave approval to deliver medicines from warehouses in Damascus to the north-east of the country. The February UNFPA convoy, which I have already mentioned, covered that route in four and a half days. Therefore, in terms of security, it is acceptable, since the UNDSS agreed to it. To a large extent, Syrian troops are clearing the key Damascus-Aleppo route to make this possible. I believe that if my colleagues allow to Permanent Representative of Syria Bashar Ja'afari to speak not limiting his speaking time nor ignoring his words, he will be able to explain in detail what the legitimate Syrian Government is doing in the humanitarian sphere, at a time when the Western community is basically "choking" the country with sanctions.
The report also refutes the wailing of some members of the Security Council about a severe lack of medical supplies in Syria's north-eastern provinces. Paragraph 5 of the report says the opposite – the hospitals have stocks that will last until May. The only sphere where the lack may occur is reproductive health, but even there we still have a month, as stated in the same paragraph.
Let me remind you that if the situation is critical, the Syrian side has already agreed to a one-time air delivery from Iraqi Erbil. That approval is on the same note.
Therefore, no matter how some SC members may try to dramatize the situation, there is a tangible progress. And the Secretary General has acknowledged this. He has also called on all parties to provide support until medicines are successful delivered to hospitals. We, for our part, stand ready to continue to facilitate this process and call on everyone to do the same. Once again, the calmer we do this, the more professionally we approach this issue, the better are chances for successful conflict resolution. The outcome of the work of recent days has only confirmed this.
Thank you for your attention.
