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Russia thinks UK-initiated draft resolution on space unacceptable — UN envoy

The First Committee’s draft resolution should center round preventing an arms race in outer space rather than dwell on space security in its broad interpretation, Russian Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN office at Geneva Andrei Belousov pointed out

UNITED NATIONS, November 1. /TASS/. The UK-initiated draft UN resolution on space has serious drawbacks and ignores Russia’s principled approaches, Russian Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations Geneva office Andrei Belousov said on Monday.

"The First Committee’s draft resolution should center round preventing an arms race in outer space rather than dwell on space security in its broad interpretation," he said at a meeting of the UN General Assembly First Committee. "Russia supports the establishment of open working groups to discuss the most pressing issues on the disarmament agenda with an aim of reaching consensus solutions."

"At the same time, we have serious questions to the mandate of the would-be working open group, which has only indirect links to the task of preventing an arms race in outer space," he noted. "It provides for a possibility of considering recommendations for the use of possible norms and principles of responsible behavior in future legally binding agreements."

According to the Russian diplomat, this is not enough. "We have more no less principled question both to the document and to its authors," he said. "We have informed our British colleagues about them more than once."

"Taking into account the fact that the draft resolution has serious drawbacks and ignores our principles approaches, we consider this document unacceptable in its present format. Russia will vote against it," he stressed.