MOSCOW, November 2. /TASS/. Russia will not tolerate any restrictions of its voting rights in the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and in case of a negative scenario it will be prepared to take action "adequate to the situation," Russia's permanent representative to the OPCW, Alexander Shulgin told an online briefing on Tuesday.
"We will do our utmost to prevent such a turn of events," he said, when asked about the steps Russia might take, should its powers in the OPCW be restricted. "If something unfavorable for Russia takes shape, believe me, we will be prepared to take action adequate to the situation. For clear reasons I would not like to elaborate," he added.
Shulgin explained that whereas in the OPCW leadership bodies, including the Executive Council, the Euro-Atlantic community's member-states may count on some majority, in the OPCW's supreme body — the Conference of the States Parties — the Western countries do not have a majority, which will make it difficult to restrict Russia's rights in the organization, should they try.
"Very often they use this circumstance and manage to push through some decisions, but we sometimes manage to thwart their schemes. At the sessions of the OPCW's supreme body the situation is not that unequivocal and the Western countries will possibly fail to get enough votes," he stated.
Shulgin did not rule out that the West in the OPCW might try to repeat the Syrian scenario in relation to Russia to try to restrict its voting rights.
In April 2021, the OPCW member-states voted for a resolution restricting Syria's rights and privileges. A total of 136 countries participated in the voting and 87 of them supported the resolution. Russia and 14 other countries opposed the document that stripped Syria of the right to participate in voting at the Conference of States Parties and in the Executive Council, be elected to it or host any activities by the above-mentioned Conference, Council or support bodies.