↔️ When it comes to the International Women’s Day, there’s a certain difference between Russia and a number of countries within “the collective West”.

🇷🇺 Russia: “We know how much in life depends on you, our dear women, on your hard work and generous souls, how much effort you put into taking care of children, keeping love, comfort and harmony within your families”.

🤷🏻‍♀️ Meanwhile, certain Western countries get confused defining “What is a woman?”

#IWD2023

⚠️SAVE THE DATE⚠️

🌐 Virtual roundtable on the margins of the 52nd session of the UN Human Rights Council: “Violations of the norms and principles of warfare by the Armed Forces of Ukraine and Ukrainian military groups”.

🗓 Date: Wednesday, March 15, 2023

🕝 Time: 2:30 - 4:30 p.m.

❗️ Gross violations of the norms and principles enshrined in the Hague Conventions, the Geneva Conventions on the Protection of Victims of War and their Additional Protocols by the AFU and Ukrainian military groups have been recorded since the spring of 2014.

💥 Regrettably, with the transition of the armed conflict into an active phase in February 2022, the number of such violations has increased dramatically. During the event, the discussion will focus on the following issues related to the AFU and Ukrainian military groups:

▪️facts of use of prohibited methods of warfare;

▪️ facts of ill-treatment and executions of POWs;

▪️ testimonies of victims and eyewitnesses of Ukrainian war crimes.

🔗 LINK to the Zoom conference

🎙 "Право на ответ" российского представителя на 52-ой сессии СПЧ ООН в ходе диалога по докладу Верховного комиссара:

❗️ Вместо того, чтобы заниматься решением своих внутренних проблем, страны ЕС, США и их последователи разжигают межнациональную рознь, поставляют оружие на Украину, позволяя своему военно-промышленному комплексу обогащаться на жизнях ни в чем не повинного гражданского населения.

🇺🇸/🇬🇧 В результате действий США и Великобритании за последние десятилетия погибли сотни тысяч гражданских лиц, женщин, детей, пожилых и инвалидов в Сербии, Ираке, Афганистане, Ливии и других странах. Никто за эти жизни с Вашингтона и Лондона так и не спросил.

🇫🇷 Франция, видимо забыв свое колониальное прошлое, вновь пытается насаждать свои порядки на африканском континенте под благовидными правозащитными предлогами, попутно жестоко подавляя любое инакомыслие у себя дома.

📄 Читать полностью

🎙 Right of reply by a Russian representative at the 52-nd Session of the UNHRC during the debates on the High Commissioner's report:

❗️ Instead of dealing with their domestic problems, the EU countries, the US and their followers provoke ethnic discord, supply weapons to Ukraine, allowing their military industries to profit off the lives of innocent civilians.

🇺🇸/🇬🇧 Hundreds of thousands of civilians, women, children, seniors and people with disabilities were killed over the past decades in Serbia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and other countries as a result of the US and UK actions. Has anyone held Washington and London accountable for these lives?

🇫🇷 France, apparently having forgotten its colonial past, is trying to once again impose its own rules under plausible human rights pretexts on the African continent while brutally suppressing any dissent at home.

📄 Full statement

🎙 Russian FM Sergey Lavrov on the situation in Georgia and the Western hypocricy:

🇬🇪 The situation in Tbilisi looks very much like Maidan in Kiev.

❗️ There is no doubt that the law demanding registration of the NGOs, if their budgets have foreign funding of just over 20%, was just a pretext to make an actual attempt at a violent coup.

🌐 The Western stance, of the US State Department, pompously declaring inadmissibility of such treatment of the civil society, raises nothing but a smile. These are the “rules” the West has been talking about. We talk about the international law, the West talks about the rules-based world order.

🇬🇪/🇲🇩 There you have it – the Georgian opposition is not only allowed, it has to do whatever it pleases. Meanwhile, protests against the ruling government in Moldova are being condemned. Because the Georgian opposition reflects the Western interests, and the opposition in Moldova doesn't, while the Western interests stand with the Moldovan government.

📑 Full statement

🇺🇳 The annual National Dress Day at the UN Human Rughts Council is a celebration of world cultures and traditions + the only day of the year, when diplomats are encouraged to dress extra fancy to work.

🇷🇺 Watch the ladies from our Mission to the UN in Geneva wear Russian traditional Sarafan dresses to the occasion.

🎙 Russian MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova’s reply to a media question regarding extension of the grain deal

❓ Question: Ukraine has resumed talks with partners regarding the grain deal. Reuters reported, with a reference to a top official in the Ukrainian authorities, that Ukraine commenced talks to extend the grain deal. According to the report, the Russian side did not take part in the talks. What can you say about these reports?

💬 Answer: We are well aware of the statements by various sides, including the Kiev regime, on the extension of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, whose second term (120 days) expires on March 18. There were no talks conducted in this regard, especially with participation of the Russian representatives.

Our general position regarding the package proposal of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, which comprises the Russia-UN Memorandum to normalise national agricultural exports, as well as the aforementioned Black Sea Grain Initiative, is well-known and remains intact.

We proceed from the fact that the agreements entered into in Istanbul on July 22, 2022, need to be fulfilled in conjunction with one another in order to resolve the specified humanitarian tasks to overcome the food crisis and help the countries in need in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

❗️ We have to state that so far only the Ukrainian part has been effectively implemented, Russian agricultural exports continue to be blocked by western unilateral sanctions.

Another round of consultations of a Russian interdepartmental delegation with UNCTAD Secretary-General Rebeca Grynspan and head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Martin Griffiths, who supervise the Russia-UN Memorandum and the Black Sea Grain Initiative, respectively, will take place in Geneva on March 13.

🎙 Комментарий заместителя Министра иностранных дел Российской Федерации С.В.Вершинина:

❌ Если коммерческий вывоз украинской продукции осуществляется устойчивыми темпами, принося немалую прибыль Киеву, то на пути российских сельхозэкспортёров по-прежнему сохраняются барьеры. Заявленные Вашингтоном, Брюсселем и Лондоном санкционные изъятия для продовольствия и удобрений на деле не работают.

❗️ В этой связи российская сторона, отмечая «пакетный» характер предложенных Генсекретарем ООН А.Гутеррешем Стамбульских договоренностей, не возражает против очередного продления «черноморской инициативы» после истечения второго срока 18 марта, но только на 60 дней.

👉🏻 Наша дальнейшая позиция будет определяться в зависимости от реального, не на словах, а на деле, прогресса по нормализации нашего сельхозэкспорта, включая банковские платежи, транспортную логистику, страховки, «размораживание» финансовой деятельности и поставки аммиака по трубопроводу «Тольятти-Одесса».

📑 Читать полностью

🎙 Statement by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Vershinin:

❗️ While the commercial export of Ukrainian products is carried out at a steady pace, bringing considerable profits to Kiev, restrictions on the Russian agricultural exporters are still in place. The sanctions exemptions for food and fertilizers announced by Washington, Brussels and London are essentially inactive.

❗️ In this regard, the Russian Side, noting the "package" nature of the “Istanbul Agreements” proposed by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, does not object to another extension of the "Black Sea Initiative" after its second term expiration on March 18, but only for 60 days.

👉🏻 Our further stance will be determined upon the tangible progress on normalization of our agricultural exports, not it words, but in deeds. It includes bank payments, transport logistics, insurance, "unfreezing" of financial activities and ammonia supplies via the “Tolyatti-Odessa” pipeline.

📑 Full statement

🎙 Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Vershinin in an interview with “TASS” and “Ria Novosti” on the “Grain Deal”:

🔹 There is much hypocrisy in the allegations that sanctions do not apply to Russian agricultural and fertilizer exports, or when Russia is accused of creating difficulties on the global food.

🔹 60 days (instead of 120) is enough to achieve tangible progress in implementing the provisions set forth in the Russia-UN Memorandum on the normalization of domestic agricultural exports.

🔹 60 days is not an ultimatum, it is a clear, principled and open stance of the Russian Side.

🔹 60 days is an important and serious signal that we need real results. Assurances are not enough.

🔹 Our response to Ukrainian wishes to expand the “Black Sea Initiative” is negative. We expect the UN and its Secretariat to maintain a neutral, objective stance and not to play up to any side.

🎙 Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova’s answer to a media question on the grain deal extension

❓ Question: What can you say about statements by State Department Press Secretary Ned Price, the EU delegation in Moscow and other officials about the grain deal extension?

💬 The first comments, including those made by Washington and the EU delegation in Moscow in connection with the announcement of the Russian position on the Black Sea Initiative regarding Ukrainian food exports are stunningly hypocritical and unprofessional. They completely distort the facts.

We understand that Moscow’s decision was a kind of a cold shower for the American and EU officials.

We realise that there was confidence in Western capitals that everything would continue to follow a scenario in which they benefit. According to this scenario, Russian agricultural exports would be blocked whereas grain exports from Ukraine would continue growing unimpeded, bringing huge profits to the Kiev regime that it needs, in part, to pay for the never-ending flow of Western weapons and ammunition.

👆 We would advise the sources of such statements to read again the Istanbul agreements and statements made by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and other UN top officials to the effect that the Black Sea Initiative and the Russia-UN memorandum on bringing Russian fertiliser and food to world markets are an interconnected, package deal. Had they done so, their words about the absence of a link between the two agreements would not have sounded so absurd and humiliating for any professional diplomat, including from the EU delegation.

Read in full

⚠️REMINDER⚠️

📺 The event starts today at 2:30 p.m. (Geneva time).

🔗 LINK to join.

Conference ID: 839 4566 3326
Passcode: 309968

🇷🇺/🇬🇧 The event will be available in Russian or with English simultaneous interpretation.

🎙 Ambassador Gennady Gatilov:

❌ You will not hear about AFU crimes from the statements of the EU, the US and its satellites, as well as from the UNHRC, the OHCHR and the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine.

❗️ All of them prefer to ignore the barbaric cruelty and disregard for any principles by the Ukrainian authorities and military, who see nothing wrong with inhumane reprisals against defenseless civilians, as well as unarmed and wounded POWs, the use of prohibited methods of warfare.
 
💥 Ukrainian armed groups continue to conduct massive shellings of Donbass cities and settlements using multiple launch rocket systems, as well as artillery systems supplied by the West. A favorite tactic among the Kiev military is to place military equipment and its fighters in schools, hospitals, and other civilian infrastructure.

🤐 It goes without saying, that it is not in the interests of Kiev's patrons to shed light and comment on such Ukrainian war crimes.

🗓 Today is the 9th anniversary of the Crimean status referendum.

On March 16, 2014, Crimeans made their historic choice on the basis of universal suffrage.

✅ The absolute majority of the peninsula’s residents, or 96.77 % with a turnout of 83 %, voted FOR the reunification with the Russian Federation.

🇷🇺 Based on that free expression of will by the regions' population, Crimea and Sevastopol were acceded to the Russian Federation as its integral parts.

🗳 The referendum was held according to international law and became the ultimate triumph of democracy.

As many as 135 international observers from 23 countries as well as 1,240 representatives of local organisations were present during the vote and praised the preparations for and the implementation of the Crimean referendum.

⚠️REMINDER⚠️

📺 The event starts today at 2:30 p.m. (Geneva time).

🔗 LINK to join.

Conference ID: 830 7887 9238
Passcode: 650327

🇷🇺/🇬🇧 The event will be available in Russian or with English simultaneous interpretation.

 💬 Ambassador Gennady Gatilov:

▪️ It is with a heavy heart that I have learned about the passing of Ambassador Valery Loshchinin. An esteemed career diplomat with over 45 years of public service, Ambassador Loshchinin exemplified genuine professionalism, devotion to his country, great intuition and wisdom.

🇨🇭 His heart always had a soft spot for Geneva, as he had spent a lot of time here serving as Deputy Permanent Representative of the USSR/Russia to the UN Office and Other International Organizations, as well as the Head of our Mission in 2005-2011.

🕯 Ambassador Loshchinin was a true patriot, a loving father and a good friend. He will be greatly missed in our vast, yet closely intertwined diplomatic community. On behalf of my colleagues at the Russian Mission and myself, I extend my most heartfelt condolences to the family and friends of Ambassador Loshchinin, to everyone who had the honor to know this remarkable man both professionally and personally.

🎙 Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s answers to questions from the Moscow.Kremlin.Putin TV show (March 15, 2023)

❓ Question: Could you comment on the recent US drone incident?

💬 Sergey Lavrov: Our military have given their assessment which was related by our ambassador in Washington Anatoly Antonov. He explained to journalists and others how we see it from a global security standpoint. He was summoned to the US State Department, where he was presented with totally unfounded claims about violations of the freedom of air.

You have heard the Pentagon, the Joint Chiefs of Staff saying that the United States will continue to fly wherever it pleases “in accordance with international law.”

☝️ But if we follow this logic, the space around the US has the same status as the space over the Black Sea.

In doing so, they completely ignore the fact that after the start of the special military operation our military declared the relevant areas of the Black Sea adjacent to the shore in certain places to have a restricted status for the use of any aircraft.

❌ The defiant disregard for this objective fact suggests that the United States is constantly trying to create some kind of provocation to fuel confrontational thinking. This is not good.

They constantly say that they are a responsible power interested in strategic stability. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told me this at the meeting in India. But their words are at odds with their deeds.

❓ Question: What does it imply for global security?

💬 Sergey Lavrov: As far as global security is concerned, any incident that triggers a clash between two of the great, major nuclear powers carries very serious risks. They surely realise this.

🎙 Ambassador Gennady Gatilov:

❌ Not every European country adheres to the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities. Especially the Baltic States, Poland and Ukraine, where governments prioritize assimilation of minorities.

🔥 In recent years, intolerance towards Russians – what we call “Russophobia”- has become especially glaring in these countries. They forcefully shut down Russian schools, Russian mass media, even the media outlets simply broadcasting in Russian.

❗️Under absolutely far-fetched pretexts of "fighting the Soviet legacy", local nationalists intensified demolitions of monuments to the soldiers who liberated their countries from Nazism, among whom were representatives of various nationalities of the Soviet Union.

‼️ Thus, they are trying to erase our common history in an attempt to assemble countries with no place for minority groups.

🎙 Joint Statement on religious intolerance in Europe delivered by a Russian representative at the 52nd Session of the UN Human Rights Council:

(🇷🇺Russia, 🇨🇳China, 🇳🇮Nicaragua, 🇲🇲Myanmar, 🇧🇾Belarus, 🇸🇾Syria, 🇰🇵DPRK, 🇮🇷Iran)

❗️ We condemn and reject acts of religious intolerance and emphasize once again our principled position that actions aimed at offending the feelings of believers and inciting inter-religious hatred are unacceptable.

❗️ We would like to reiterate our strong stance on the critical importance for social cohesion and sustainable development of mutual understanding and tolerance in regard to religion, beliefs, culture, ethnicity and language.

❗️ We call upon all States to further promote joint efforts in order to achieve the goal of building a world where individuals of diverse faiths, religions, beliefs, languages and cultures would co-exist in harmony and enjoy equal rights and mutual respect.

📄 Full statement

🇺🇳 The Group of Friends in Defense of the UN Charter - Geneva Chapter - gathered on March 17, 2023, for its inaugural meeting.

🎙 Ambassador Gennady Gatilov:

🤝 Our nations share a strong commitment to the universal norms of international law enshrined in the UN Charter, including the principles of sovereign equality of States and non-interference in their domestic affairs.

❗️ At the same time, it is clear that the members of the “collective West” are casting these principles aside. They promote the notorious “rules-based world order”. This concept rests on arbitrary interpretation of the norms of inter-government interaction and seeks to undermine the central coordinating role of the UN in international affairs.

👉 The West also attempts to impose its own vision of the “perfect world development” by imposing unilateral sanctions. It destructively attempts to turn the UN into a tool to artificially inflate anti-Russian hysteria and reinforce hostile sentiments towards the countries in our Group.