Riyaz Patel
The reason for the world’s current state lies “first and foremost” in the unwillingness of the self-proclaimed winners of the Cold War to reckon with “the legitimate interests of other States,” Russia’s Foreign Minister has said.
The West ignores reality by trying to prevent the formation of a multi-polar world by imposing its narrow “liberal” rules on others, Sergey Lavrov told the UN General Assembly.
Lavrov’s speech at the UN headquarters in New York Friday focused on global challenges, and he did not hold back, launching into a full-on rebuke of the Western ideal of world order.
“It’s hard for the West to accept that its centuries-long domination is diminishing.“
New centers of economic growth and political influence are emerging internationally, he said, but the US and its allies are trying to impede the rise of the multi-polar world.
In order to achieve this, Lavrov said, they “impose the standards of conduct based on narrow Western interpretation of liberalism on others.
In short, ‘We’re liberals hence anything is permitted to us,’ he said characterizing this attitude.
“Leading Western nations are trying to recover their privileged positions by imposing their standards of conduct on others.”
Lavrov maintained that “Western countries are trying to impede the development of the polycentric world.”
“It is hard for the West to put up with its weakening centuries-long dominance in world affairs,” even though new economic centres and political influences have emerged, Russia’s FM said.
“Attacks on international law are looming large,” Lavrov stated, pointing to the US withdrawal from the UN-endorsed Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, known commonly as the Iran nuclear deal.
And, he added, the US has “set a hard line” towards eroding UN resolutions on the international legal framework of the Middle East peace process.
“It suggests waiting for some ‘deal of the century’, meanwhile it has taken unilateral decisions on Jerusalem and the Golan Heights,” endangering the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, he underlined.
Russia’s Foreign Minister underscored that universal conventions together with the UN Security Council resolutions “are an integral part of international law,” and yet the West would like to substitute them for its own rules.
“We’re seeing continued games played with conventions that commit countries to upholding linguistic, educational, religious and other rights of national minorities,” he outlined.
“Even here our Western colleagues are guided by their own rules – they turn a blind eye to the open denial of national minorities’ rights and abet the retaining of an ignominious phenomenon of statelessness in Europe.”
Citing the UN Charter’s principle of non-interference in internal affairs, Lavrov said attempts are underway to add Venezuela “to the list of countries whose Statehood was destroyed before our eyes through aggression or coups inspired from abroad.”
