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Russia to agree on no further unilateral steps to cease hostilities in Syria — envoy

"What we need is a serious process, without fooling around," Vitaly Churkin, Russian Ambassador to UN, said
Vitaly Churkin, Russian Ambassador to UN EPA/JASON SZENES
Vitaly Churkin, Russian Ambassador to UN
© EPA/JASON SZENES

UNITED NATIONS, September 25. /TASS/. Russia will agree on no further unilateral steps to cease hostilities in Syria after the United States’ tactical tricks that gave terrorist groups time to regroup and reinforce, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin said on Sunday at an extraordinary meeting of the Security Council.

"Requests for ceasefire — now for 48 hours, then for 72 hours — have become a routine practice," he said. "We have always been making concessions, at least tried, and reached agreements with the Syrian government. In the long run, it all ended in militants’ regrouping, receiving reinforcement and staging new offensives."

Then, he said, a demand followed that the Syrian government unilaterally stop flights of its warplanes as a preliminary condition. "First they said for three days. We agreed. Then they said, ‘No, the US president has changed his mind, we need seven days.’ No one knows why. Such tactical tricks cannot go on endlessly. We will agree on no further unilateral steps," he said.

He said the Russia-US talks yielded a detailed plan which, if duly implemented, will help "ease the situation on the ground, cardinally improve the humanitarian situation and give a start to resumption of the United Nations-brokered intra-Syrian talks," Churkin said, adding that the deal had many opponents and "it looks like their non-constructive position has outweighed the drive for peace and common sense."

The American side, in his words, "has actually acknowledged its inability to influence the groups it controls and honestly implement the agreements," first of all, to separate moderate groups from terrorists and "draw relevant division lines on the ground."

"It is written in black and white in all documents. Nothing has been done. Even in what concerned listing terrorist groups, we saw only groping prompting one to think that the key goal is still to retain combat potential of the Syrian government’s opponents, whoever they might be," he said.

"What we need is a serious process, without fooling around. Conditions should not be changed every other day because we have a deal. What must be done is to implement it," Churkin continued.

However he said he doesn’t think the Russia-US agreements could be given up for lost. "I don’t think so, but the situation is extremely difficult. I don’t think it (the deal) is dead," he stressed.