Syria to Be Sovereign When No Western-Trained Terrorists Present - Russian Envoy to UN

UNITED NATIONS (Sputnik) - Syria would re-gain its sovereignty when it achieves that no Western-trained terrorists seeking to topple the country’s legitimate government are present on its territory, Russian Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations Dmitriy Polyanskiy said during a General Assembly debate on Thursday.

"However, nothing is preventing Syrian sovereignty from being respected in this matter, nothing other than the unwillingness of Western countries to stop supporting international terrorists, whom they trained and equipped to oust the legitimate Syrian authorities," Polyanskiy said.

The General Assembly debate was held to explain Russia rationale for vetoing the Irish-Norwegian resolution on granting an extension for the cross-border mechanism for Syria at the UN Security Council.

Explaining the use of a veto by UN Security Council permanent members is part of the new rules whereby they have to provide the rationale for their decisions to all members of the United Nations.

The proposed resolution on Syria, drafted by humanitarian pen-holders Norway and Ireland, largely mirrored Russia’s proposal that had previously been voted down.

The Western countries wanted to extend automatically the cross-border mechanism for 12 months, but Russia said it could only support a six-month extension.