All news

Russia hopes observer mission in Syria to be prolonged in future

We pin high hopes on both sides to observe the UN Security Council appeal to ensure security of observers,” the Russian foreign minister said

MOSCOW, July 26 (Itar-Tass) —— Russia hopes that the observer mission in Syria will be prolonged in the future, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said after the negotiations with his Serbian counterpart Vuk Jeremic here on Thursday.

“The UN Security Council resolution that prolonged the observer mission for 30 days, has a special supplement that it was done with due account of those recommendations, which the UN general secretary introduced in the report. In the report he offered to cut the number of observers for this period of 30 days, because it is unsafe to work in several regions, and proposed to build up the political component of the observer mission, which is intended to establish some ties between the government and the opposition,” Lavrov noted. “So, this is the cuts (in the number of observers) under the mandate, which the mission was granted according to the resolution on the prolongation of the observer mission,” the minister said.

“Certainly, we want so that observers were granted an opportunity to work in all places, where the government and the opposition confront. We pin high hopes on both sides to observe the UN Security Council appeal to ensure security of observers,” the Russian foreign minister said.

“I hope that in this case in 25 days, when the 30-day term will expire, the UN Security Council will be able to prolong this mission in the future, particularly to decide on the restoration of its numerical strength and probably decide on a larger staff as compared with the initial contingent. In this case we will be ready to dispatch 30 (our) military observers to this mission,” the Russian minister underlined.