Embassy Press Officer replies to a media question on the legal basis of air strikes against Syria
Question: The UK has published its legal position claiming that the legal basis for the strikes against Syria is “humanitarian intervention”. Does Russia agree with that?
Answer: First of all, the concept of “humanitarian intervention”, actively promoted by the West in the 1990s, has been rejected by the international community. As such, it cannot possibly serve as a legal basis for any use of force. International law only allows to use force in self-defence or under a Security Council mandate.
The fact that Britain refers to “humanitarian intervention” is therefore a direct acknowledgement of the unlawfulness of the air strikes. The specific arguments used by the UK in support of its position confirm this further.
The gist of British reasoning is that the whole international community recognizes that a “new” chemical attack in Syria is imminent and that only the air strikes could prevent it. Yet, let alone a new attack, the international community is not convinced that a chemical attack took place in Douma, and wants to see the results of the ongoing OPCW investigation. When international monitors are arriving in Damascus, and – more broadly – when the Syrian government and large parts of the opposition are moving towards creating a constitutional committee to end the war, to say that “there is no practicable alternative to the use of force if lives are to be saved” is hypocritical, to say the least.
We should add that today, speaking at the Andrew Marr Show, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson admitted that the strikes were not about saving lives or actually prevening President Assad from further chemical attacks, but should simply be seen as a “message”.
Let’s leave legal details to lawyers. But one doesn’t need deep expertise to see that we are dealing with an attack under a false pretext, a false legal basis and a false result.
During the recent visit of Ukrainian President Zelensky to London the UK Government did not spare words to reiterate its full support for Ukrainian reforms and territorial integrity. New calls were made for the implementation of the Minsk Agreements, the premise being that it is Russia and “Russia-backed separatists” who hamper the political process. Yet the reality is quite the opposite. We believe it is important to set the record straight: the Minsk Agreements and political engagements based on them are being persistently and deliberately ignored by Ukraine itself (with the connivance and, often, encouragement of its Western backers).
Referring to the subject of the BBC Series – White Helmets and James Le Mesurier – the Russian position is well-founded. Vast amounts of evidence on the ground as well as intelligence information which Russia has at its disposal unequivocally point to direct links between the White Helmets and terrorist organisations operating in Syria.
The suggestion that the Russian State may conduct any kind of propaganda against the AstraZeneca vaccine is itself an example of disinformation. It is obviously aimed at discrediting Russia’s efforts in combating the pandemic, including the good cooperation we have established with the UK in this field.
On 5 October 2020 Russian Ambassador to the UK Andrei Kelin held an online meeting with members of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Russia. Members of both the House of Lords and the House of Commons, representing all major political parties of the country, took part in the conversation.
The Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group (Igor Popov of the Russian Federation, Stéphane Visconti of France, and Andrew Schofer of the United States of America) released the following statement today: The Co-Chairs strongly condemn the continued violence in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone as well as against targets in the territory of Armenia and Azerbaijan away from the Line of Contact, and express our alarm at reports of increasing civilian casualties. Targeting or threatening civilians is never acceptable under any circumstances. The Co-Chairs call on the sides to observe fully their international obligations to protect civilian populations.
We noted the EU’s October 2 decision to adopt new restrictive measures as regards Belarus. A comment declaring response measures has already been released by Belarusian officials. We see that instead of displaying restraint, which is so vital for stabilisation in Belarus, the European Union has once again resorted to the instrument of sanctions. This approach is unilateral and illegal. It undermines the prerogatives of the UN Security Council and leads to the further erosion of international law.
There is growing concern regarding the professional credentials of Permanent Representative of the United States to the Conference on Disarmament Robert Wood. On October 1, 2020, during a briefing hosted by the Foreign Press Association at the United Nations Office in Geneva he said that he did not know what Russia’s initiatives to prevent an arms race in outer space were about. As a reminder, for 40 years Russia (and earlier the USSR) has consistently advocated the drafting of a multilateral legally binding instrument that would prohibit the deployment of weapons of any kind, as well as the use or threat of force in outer space.
On 26 September 2020 Third Secretary of the Embassy Vadim Retyunskiy presented the Ushakov medal to the Arctic Convoys veteran Mr William Geoffrey ROBINSON who was awarded this military honour by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation for his personal courage and bravery displayed in WWII.
The Russian Federation has been acting in the most transparent manner in the situation around Mr. Alexey Navalny from the very beginning. At the request of relatives, he was promptly granted permission to travel to Germany for medical treatment, which he did without hindrance, once the doctors at the Omsk hospital managed to stabilize his condition. Moreover, Russian doctors passed on to their German colleagues the data they had collected on the patient's health condition and were ready to continue to work together for the sake of his speedy recovery.
One of today’s major strategic challenges is the risk of a large-scale confrontation in the digital field. A special responsibility for its prevention lies on the key players in the field of ensuring international information security (IIS). In this regard, we would like to once again address the US with a suggestion to agree on a comprehensive program of practical measures to reboot our relations in the field of security in the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs).
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