The official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry noted that UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres "cannot have any independent position, especially on territorial issues"MOSCOW, October 6.
/tass/. The UN Secretariat has once again confirmed its biased and unprincipled position regarding the situation around Ukraine. This is stated in a comment issued on Thursday by the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova in connection with the statement of UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who described the referendums in the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions as "annexation".
"During his briefing on October 5, the official representative of the UN Secretary General, Stephane Dujarric, that is, the person speaking on behalf of Antonio Guterres, seemed to try to justify himself. However, if we look into it, we haven't heard anything new and encouraging. The secretariat's biased and unprincipled approach to the Ukrainian story has once again been confirmed," Zakharova stressed.
The official representative of the Russian diplomatic department noted that "the Secretary General cannot have any independent "position", especially on territorial issues." "According to the [UN] Charter, this position assumes the functions of the Chief Administrative Officer of the UN. We pointed this out in the comments of the Russian permanent mission to the UN and the official representative of the Foreign Ministry," she added.
According to Zakharova, "relying on non-consensual decisions of the [UN] General Assembly, representatives of the Secretariat forget about the unanimously adopted documents of the Security Council." "Such a [document] at one time was the Security Council resolution 2202, which approved a set of measures to implement the Minsk agreements. For seven years, Kiev has openly flouted the provisions of this document, in particular, Petro Poroshenko and Vladimir Zelensky did not hesitate to publicly declare its insignificance," she recalled. "We have not received any condemnatory reaction from the UN Secretariat, from which we conclude that the Secretariat deliberately selectively applies the decisions of the Member states."
"Speaking about the need to preserve the territorial integrity of Ukraine and relying on the provisions of the UN Charter and the Declaration on Friendly Relations and Cooperation between States of 1970, representatives of the Secretariat "forget" an important point," Zakharova emphasized. "The last document clearly states that the above principle applies only to those States where "Governments represent, without distinction of race, religion or skin color, all the people living in a given territory." It is obvious that the Kiev authorities do not belong to such," she pointed out. - Moreover, "every State is obliged to refrain from any violent actions that deprive peoples <...> of their right to self-determination, freedom and independence." I think, in this context, it is not worth mentioning the seven-year shelling of Donbass."
"In general, there are no "turns" in the rhetoric of the representatives of the UN Secretariat. The only thing they were able to do was to slightly "polish" the Russophobic statements of the most rabid supporters of Kiev," the diplomat concluded.
