Statement by Chargé d'Affaires of the Permanent Mission of Russia to the UN Dmitry Polyanskiy at the meeting of UNGA plenary on the implementation of UN75 resolution
We thank President of the General Assembly V.Bozkir for initiating this important discussion. We listened with great interest to the statement made by Secretary-General A.Guterres. We agree with many of his thoughts and assessments.
Russia consecutively stands for enhancing multilateralism, strengthening universal international institutions that ensure that interests of all states be taken into account when elaborating approaches to solving problems of international character. We believe implementation of principles of true inclusive multilateralism is a vital condition for further democratization of international relations and mitigating conflict potential in the world.
We advocate for solving international problems by political and diplomatic means, through dialogue and, most importantly, without interference in the internal affairs of states. As a multilateral mechanism of universal legitimacy, the United Nations plays the key role in this process, which we comprehensively support.
When acting at the UN platform and in other international organizations, Russia has always consistently promoted global solidarity, mutual respect, multilateralism and collective work. In this crisis pandemic-dominated year, all these principles have proven their justness and relevance.
At the same time, we are concerned over attempts to fragment the effective multilateral system of international relations, create a sort of “interest clubs”, promote disputable concepts. Thus, we have many questions regarding the concept of “rules-based order” that has been put forward by a number of states. Its sponsors keep pretending that this is all about some universal idea and try to gradually have it substitute for the international law. It creates a persistent impression that they are attempting to legitimize the practice of decision-making by a small group of countries and imposing those decisions on the rest of the global community. We are convinced that such a model of inter-state interaction is fraught with undermining the central role of the United Nations, its Charter and the universally recognized norms of the international law.
Our conclusions are confirmed by ever more frequent attempts of some states to bet on unilateral measures, i.a. of coercive nature, on the pretext of protecting the “rules-based order”. And this is happening amidst a COVID-19 pandemic which demands the global community to uphold solidarity, make collective efforts and provide effective assistance to the countries and regions that suffer most.
In this context, we would like once again to draw attention to the initiative of President of Russia V.Putin to create "green corridors" free from trade wars and sanctions, first of all to facilitate the movement of essential goods, food, remedies, personal protective equipment that are required to counter the pandemic. Already now, working jointly with UN agencies, Member States could develop measures of monitoring the impact of UCMs on post-covid recovery. Obviously, the UN system must not stay indifferent to the calls of the Secretary-General and many countries of the world to lift unilateral sanctions. Solidarity is also needed in such issues as development and usage of treatment and vaccines against the coronavirus – Russia is ready for inclusive international cooperation in this area. We believe competitiveness or attempts to depreciate achievements of other states for one’s own mercenary interests are immoral and unacceptable.
In conclusion, we would like to emphasize that we can promote effectiveness of the United Nations and improve its capacity to respond to the existing and emerging challenges only if we act collectively, respect interests of all member states and rely on the international law, of which the UN Charter is the main pillar. This must be an important step towards establishing a truly multilateral and equitable world.
