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New UN resolution on Syria addressed to all parties - Churkin

Churkin expressed serious concern with the intention of some countries to finance armed groups in Syria

UNITED NATIONS, April 15 (Itar-Tass) – Vitaly Churkin, Russia’s Ambassador to the United Nations, said Russia was in whole satisfied with a resolution on Syria which the U.N. Security Council adopted on Saturday.

“We spent several long and sometimes squally hours in the consultations room trying to make the resolution suitable for Russia,” Churkin told journalists after a Security Council meeting that unanimously voted for a resolution to send the vanguard of observers to Syria.

Churkin emphasized that the document’s provisions were addressed to the Syrian government and all other parties in conflict who are supposed to implement the aforesaid resolution and all the elements of Kofi Annan’s plan.

“We consider the document to be well-balanced and think that all parties in Syria should study it in detail,” Churkin went on to say.

Moscow believes that the start of a political process and a political dialogue, of which there are no signs so far, should be the next step on the way to the Syrian settlement. Kofi Annan, the U.N. and Arab League special envoy for Syria, is doing his best to make that possible and that inspires some optimism.

“I hope that all members of the world community are doing the same. As you know, Russia is being actively involved in this process, entering into dialogue not only with the government but also with various representatives of the Syrian opposition,” Churkin went on to say.

The Russian ambassador called on his colleagues to realize their responsibility for the developments in Syria, gain maximum from an opportunity that has opened up and try to sustain the fragile progress achieved by Kofi Annan.

Churkin expressed serious concern with the intention of some countries to finance armed groups in Syria.

“If you keep paying the militants, they will never stop fighting. That is why arms supplies to Syria, and we know how that is done, are extremely harmful. Any militarization of the conflict is dangerous and will contradict Annan’s plan. He himself made that clear to the members of the U.N. Security Council at the very start of his mission,” Churkin said.

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