MOSCOW, August 31. /TASS/: Most of Russia's proposals and calls were ignored in the UN Security Council's resolution on Afghanistan, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a commentary on Tuesday.
"Most of our proposals have been ignored. The authors of the resolution emphatically refused to include in the special paragraph, devoted to the struggle against terrorism, any mention of the Islamic State (outlawed in Russia) and the Islamic Movement of East Turkestan, which pose a serious threat to security in the region," the commentary runs. "Absent from the resolution are any statements about the importance of preventing a situation where the evacuation of skilled Afghan personnel might cause adverse effects on the socio-economic position of the country and its ability to achieve sustainable development goals, as well as preventing harmful effects of the freeze of national financial assets on the economic and humanitarian situation in Aghanistan."
Zakharova said that resolution 2593 was authored by the Western troika of the UN Security Council's permanent members (the United States, Britain and France), with Russia making a "tangible contribution" to keeping the document balanced to the maximum extent and consonant with the crucial tasks of Afghan settlement. However, as Zakharova said, the final wording showed "no understanding" of Moscow's calls for complementing the clause on humanitarian assistance by a "reference to the imperative of conducting such activity in strict accordance with the fundamental principles of the United Nations of providing humanitarian assistance, contained in resolution 46/182 of the UN General Assembly."
"Once again it was disappointing to see the Western partners' practice of creating artificial haste in coordinating the UN Security Council's document," Zakharova said. "There is every reason to suspect that Washington, London and Paris had managed to polish the wording among themselves in the narrow format to submit it to the Security Council for consideration at the very last moment. A confirmation of this can be seen in the leaks to the media about the troika's initiative before the Russian side received any signals from its authors."
At the same time, Moscow has noticed that some of Russia's concerns were taken into account in the work on the document. In the final version "the focus of the document was shifted to the most important issues of resistance to terrorism," and "cleared of the most intrusive passages concerning human rights problems," and "a special clause was added on the need for preventing possible repeated terrorist attacks at Kabul's airport."
"We see through the positive lens the decision to include in the resolution a call addressed to the international donors and humanitarian agencies to provide assistance to Afghanistan and the main countries that accommodate refugees," Zakharova said.
Having studied the ratio of the accepted and ignored proposals from Moscow Russia, just like China, had to abstain in the final count, when the resolution was put to the vote.
"We hope that in the future the Western partners will pay greater attention to the concerns of their colleagues in the Security Council while working on the Afghan track. We proceed from the assumption that preserving the Security Council's unity regarding the Afghan settlement problem is a priority at this stage, which is most important for the country and the whole region," Zakharova concluded.
