For its war in Ukraine, Russia made its case to the world on Saturday, repeating a series of grievances about its neighbour and the West to take military action to tell the U.N. General Assembly meeting of leaders that Moscow had “no choice”.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov sought to shift the focus to Washington, after days of denunciations of Russia at the prominent diplomatic gathering.
The international system that the U.N. represents in his speech cantered on a claim that the United States and its allies, not Russia, as the West maintains, are aggressively undermining.
To a 19th-century U.S. policy that essentially proclaimed American influence over the Western Hemisphere from the U.S. war in Iraq invoking history ranging in the early 2000s to the 20th-century Cold War.
As a bully that tries to afford Lavrov portrayed the U.S. “with impunity wherever they want the sacred right to act” and can’t accept a world where others also advance their national interests.
He maintained “The United States and allies want to stop the march of history”.
The U.S. and Ukraine didn’t retort at the assembly on Saturday but can still offer formal responses later in the meeting. Both countries’ presidents have already given their own speeches describing Russia as a dangerous aggressor that must be stopped.
The West is aiming to “destroy and fracture Russia” in order to “remove from the global map a geopolitical entity that has become all too independent”, for his part, Lavrov, accused.
For its Feb. 24 invasion denouncing its nuclear threats, alleging it has committed atrocities and war crimes, the Ukraine war has largely dominated the discussion at the assembly’s big annual meeting, and many countries have laid into Russia, and lambasting its decision to mobilize call up some of its reserves even as the assembly met.
Swedish Foreign Minister Ann Linde declared on Saturday “Neither partial mobilization, nuclear saber-rattling, nor any other escalation will deter us from supporting Ukraine”.
In the sprawling chamber Russia does have some friends, and one Belarus offered a full-throated defence Saturday of its big neighbour. Vladimir Makei, Belarusian Foreign Minister said “it was precisely the West that made this conflict inevitable” in Ukraine, Echoing Russia’s talking points.
On whether to join Russia the speeches came amid voting in Russian-occupied parts of eastern and southern Ukraine. Kyiv and its Western allies view them as Kremlin-orchestrated shams with a foregone conclusion but Moscow characterizes the referendums as self-determination.
For Russian President Vladimir Putin as a pretext eventually to escalate the war further some observers think the expected outcome could serve.
Antony Blinken, U.S. Secretary of State warned the U.N. Security Council on Thursday, “To liberate this land as an attack on so-called ‘Russian territory we can expect President Putin will claim any Ukrainian effort”.
As the West “throwing a fit” they belong Lavrov dismissed the complaints about people making a choice on where they feel.
In Ukraine for what it calls its “special military operation” Russia has offered a number of explanations. Lavrov recapped a couple: risks to Russia from what he considered a hostile government in Kyiv and a NATO alliance that has expanded eastward over the years and especially its eastern region of the Donbas of what Moscow views as the Ukrainian government’s oppression relieving Russians living in Ukraine.
Lavrov said “To recognize the two regions that make up the Donbas as independent and then to send troops in but the incapacity of Western countries to negotiate and the continued war by the Kyiv regime against their own people left us with no choice”.
The aim was “to remove the threats against our security, which NATO has been consistently creating in Ukraine”, he explained.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukrainian President earlier this week warned the assembly that he believes Moscow wants to spend the winter getting ready for a new offensive, or at least preparing fortifications while mobilizing more troops, while from some areas in the northeast Ukraine has recently driven Russian troops.
From all of Ukraine he declared that his forces will ultimately oust Russian troops regardless.
“With the force of arms we can do it. Zelenskyy said “But we need time,” this year the only leader who was allowed to address the assembly by video.
Touching off a global food crisis the war has disrupted the trade of Ukrainian and Russian grain and Russian fertilizer. A deal recently brokered by the U.N. and Turkey fertilizer shipments have proved more difficult but has helped get Ukrainian grain moving.
With the deal at a meeting with U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres this week he discussed problems, Lavrov said at a news conference after his speech.
Against Russia, although international sanctions did not target food and fertilizer exports, shipping and insurance companies and banks have been loath to deal with Moscow and the Kremlin has frequently alleged that Western sanctions have exacerbated the crisis.
Russia wants fertilizer stuck in European ports to be given to needy countries quickly, on Saturday Lavrov told reporters.
On Thursday at the Security Council in a rare moment when Lavrov and his Ukrainian counterpart, Ukraine and Russia faced off, Dmytro Kuleba, were in the same room though they kept their distance.
To deplore Russia’s aggression against Ukraine the General Assembly voted overwhelmingly in March, calling for immediate withdrawal of all Russian forces, and urged protection for millions of civilians. To suspend Russia from the U.N. The Human Rights Council the next month, members agreed by a smaller margin.
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