UNITED NATIONS - Russia on Thursday blocked the adoption of a draft statement condemning a deadly Syrian mortar attack on a Turkish town and proposed a weaker text that would call for "restraint" on the border without referring to breaches of international law.
“The members of the Security Council called on the parties
to exercise restraint and avoid military clashes which could
lead to a further escalation of the situation in the border area
between Syria and Turkey,” said Russia’s proposed statement,
which was obtained by Reuters.
If adopted, the non-binding statement would also call on the
two neighbors to “reduce tensions and forge a path toward a
peaceful resolution of the Syrian crisis.” The Syrian mortar
attack on Wednesday killed five Turkish civilians.
The Russian drafts keeps some of the language in the
original text proposed by Azerbaijan, and urges the Syrian
government to investigate the attack.
The United States also proposed amendments to “strengthen”
the original text, according a Western diplomat.
The original draft, circulated to the 15-nation council on
Wednesday, condemned “in the strongest terms” the Syrian army’s
shelling of a town in Turkey and demanded an end to violations
of Turkish territory.
“This represents a demonstration of the spilling over of the
crisis in Syria into neighboring states to an alarming degree,”
say both the Russian and the initial draft.
However, the Russians proposed removing the following
sentence, which diplomats said was crucial language: “Such
violations of international law constitute a serious threat to
international peace and security.”
The language removed by the Russia, U.N. envoys say, was
intended to signal that the Security Council, which is supposed
to be the guardian of international peace and security, should
remain involved in the matter.
Some 30,000 people have been killed across Syria, activists
say, in a conflict with growing sectarian overtones which
threatens to draw in regional Sunni Muslim and Shi’ite powers.
Council diplomats said they would continue negotiating on
the draft statement. U.S. Ambassador to United Nations Susan
Rice told reporters before heading into a council meeting on
other issues: “Let’s go work on it.”
The decision to try to issue a council statement was a
response to a request from Turkey, which asked council members
on Wednesday to take the “necessary action” to stop Syrian
aggression and ensure that the government there respect Turkish
territorial integrity.
“This is an act of aggression by Syria against Turkey,”
Turkish U.N. Ambassador Ertugrul Apakan said in a letter to the
president of the 15-nation Security Council, Guatemalan
Ambassador Gert Rosenthal.
“It constitutes a flagrant violation of international law as
well as a breach of international peace and security,” said the
letter, which was obtained by Reuters.
It was unlikely that the council would do anything more than
issue a statement for the time being. The Security Council has
been deadlocked on Syria’s 18-month-long conflict for more than
a year.
Russia, a staunch ally of Syria’s, and China have vetoed
three resolutions condemning Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s
government.
