The United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution No. 1566, on Russian initiative. It binds all countries to bring terrorists and their accomplices, harborers and donors to the dock, he emphatically added.
Terrorism is not to be identified with a particular religion or ethnicity. Russia is firm on that point. Such identification is a dangerous delusion, stressed the President.
None but terrorists and their benefactors gain by unleashing a conflict between religions and civilizations, and by setting nations on each other. "We shall cherish unity and interethnic accord. We shall defend it, if need be. That must be clear to all who think that our multiethnic and multi-denominational countries and nations can be split and weakened by setting particular communities on each other," Mr. Putin went on.
Russia and India have fallen victim to many terrorist crimes, and know what bereavement is. They share understanding of the essence and principles of the anti-terror cause. Both have vast Muslim communities, and border on leading Muslim countries. Due to all that, Russia and India are playing a unique part in settling acute problems of the Muslim world, he pointed out.
Some say the United Nations and its institutions can no longer offer a proper rebuff to contemporary challenges. That is wrong, holds President Putin.
The heart of the matter is not in whether UN mechanisms are effective or not. It is in whether UN member countries are willing to join hands for resolute efforts toward a common goal.
Russia is willing to consider reasonable options for a UN reform-in particular, to extend its Security Council membership, added Mr. Putin.
The United Nations is certainly entitled to a leading coordination role as a collective answer to current threats is being worked out, he remarked.
As President Putin had said on previous occasions, and said today, again, Russia is in favor of India's nomination for tentative permanent Security Council membership. That is Russia's principled stance.
