Russia vetoed a French-drafted UN Security Council resolution on Saturday that would have demanded an end to air strikes and military flights over Syria’s city of Aleppo, while a rival draft initiative by Russia also failed to get a minimum nine votes in favor. The draft initiated by Moscow was effectively an amended version of the French draft, which removed the demand for an end to air strikes on Aleppo, diverting the focus back to a nationwide cessation of hostilities, rather than crippling Assad’s aerial superiority. Russian ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin, who is council President for the month of October, described the dual votes as one of the “strangest spectacles in the history of the Security Council.”
“Today we are participating in one of the strangest spectacles in the history of the Security Council. We have to vote on two draft resolutions of the Council while we are all well aware that neither will be adopted. Given that the crisis in Syria is at a critical stage when it is particularly important that there be a coordination of the political efforts of the international community this waste of time is inadmissible,” said Vitaly Churkin, Russian Ambassador to the UN.
“Today was time for the Council to act, to learn the lessons of the recent past. We failed to do that because one of us, perversely the president of the United Nations Security Council, is intent on allowing the killing to continue and indeed participating in carrying it out. It is grotesque,” said David Pressman, Dep. US Ambassador to the UN.
Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces, backed by Russian aerial support and Iranian ground support, have been battling to re-capture the eastern part of the city of Aleppo, an area held by rebel groups – some of which are Western-backed, while others linked to Al-Qaeda – an area where more than 250,000 civilians are reportedly trapped.
Meanwhile, in an interview to French media, Paris’ top diplomat – Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said he will ask the international court of Justice to investigate possible war crimes in Syria – where the bloody conflict has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people while displacing some 11 million civilians.