MOSCOW, December 7 /TASS/. Western countries are blindly using developing nations, encouraging them to support the seizure of Russian assets and the creation of a tribunal against Russia within the UN General Assembly, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the Primakov Readings forum on Wednesday.
"According to the UN Charter, only the Security Council can make such decisions," he noted. "This is why, when the West promoted a resolution on reparations about a month ago, they provided very interesting arguments to developing countries. The developing nations to whom they appealed said that you know, it’s not legitimate because the General Assembly, who only passes recommendatory resolutions, cannot declare that it will seize the state assets of a sovereign UN member. The response was the following: no, no, no, <...> it’s only about the moral and ethical evaluation of Russia’s actions," Lavrov added.
"In other words, they are trying to persuade those who doubt that it will just be a political statement and they (Western countries - TASS) will do all the work to create a mechanism to seize Russia’s assets and ensure reparation payments outside the United Nations. That said, you can see that the UN is being used blindly. They are now trying to do the same in terms of the idea to create an international tribunal [against Russia]," the Russian top diplomat emphasized.
Lavrov stressed that any decision of that kind was "legally null and void" and it would impose obligations neither on Russia nor on any other country. "It just discredits the UN General Assembly," Lavrov stated.