Keir Starmer accused Russia of violating the UN charter because its invasion of Ukraine was illegal…reports Asian Lite News
Keir Starmer has told Russia he does not know how it can show its face at the United Nations after invading Ukraine and treating its own citizens as “bits of meat to fling into the grinder”.
Addressing the UN security council, of which Russia is one of five permanent members, Starmer delivered a direct message to Moscow that it should not be present at the meeting.
He accused Russia of violating the UN charter because its invasion of Ukraine was illegal, threatened global security and had caused “colossal human suffering”.
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“We must ensure accountability for those violating the UN charter and this council must recommit to the values that it sets out,” he said. “This should go without saying. Yet, the greatest violation of the charter in a generation has been committed by one of this council’s permanent members.”
He drew attention to the 35,000 civilians who have been killed or injured, the 6 million forced to flee and almost 20,000 Ukrainian children kidnapped by Russia.
The British prime minister added: “I think of Yaroslav Bazylevych, whose wife and three daughters were killed earlier this month by a Russian strike on civilians in Lviv. And I wonder how Russia can show its face in this building.
“Six hundred thousand Russian soldiers have also been killed or wounded in this war. And for what? The UN charter, which they sit here to uphold, speaks of human dignity. Not treating your own citizens as bits of meat to fling into the grinder.”
As well as calling for accountability for Russia, Starmer also addressed the conflicts in the Middle East, saying the region was “on the brink”.
He called for diplomacy and an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, and an immediate, full and complete ceasefire in relation to Israel’s war in Gaza with the release of all the hostages.
“We need a political route to that agreement, which provides a bridge to a better future. A credible and irreversible path towards a viable Palestinian state,” he said. “Alongside a safe and secure state of Israel. This is the only way to provide security and justice for both Israelis and Palestinians.”
Starmer’s trip to the United Nations general assembly in New York is his third trip to the US in three months. The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is also attending to present his “victory plan” to Joe Biden and the US presidential candidates, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.
Zelenskyy has been seeking permission to use British-French made Storm Shadow missiles on Russian territory, with UK support, but negotiations with the US are still continuing as the weapons use some US technology.
Pressed on when a decision would be made about the use of UK-supplied Storm Shadow missiles within Russia, Starmer said: “We will have discussions about a whole range of issues, and we will listen carefully to what President Zelenskyy’s got to say, and that’s what’s going to happen in the next few days.”
He added the discussions would not be about the “sole issue like long-range missiles” but a “strategic, overarching route for Ukraine to find a way through this and succeed against Russian aggression”.
Addressing the UN security council on Tuesday, Zelenskyy accused Moscow of committing “international crimes” by targeting Ukrainian civilians and energy infrastructure, and claimed he had proof that Putin was plotting to target three Ukrainian nuclear power plants to further degrade the country’s energy grid.
PM wants to meet Trump and Harris before polls
Starmer has said he wants to meet Kamala Harris and Donald Trump before the US presidential election in November. It comes amid reports No 10 aides are hoping to set up meetings with both candidates this week, whilst the prime minister attends a UN summit in New York.
Asked whether he would meet them during the trip, he replied it would be “very good to meet both of them at some stage” before the poll. “We’ll just have to see what’s possible,” he told reporters on his flight over.
“But I’m going for the [UN] General Assembly. I don’t doubt that a lot of time is going to be spent on the Middle East and Ukraine,” he added.
Starmer has not met either candidate in person, although he spoke to Trump on the phone in the wake of the assassination attempt against him in July. His suggestion he would like to meet the Republican candidate in the coming weeks, however, comes amid an awkward spat with one of his Labour ministers.
According to the Guardian, Home Office minister Angela Eagle told a fringe event at Labour’s annual conference that Trump had emboldened racists in Britain through his own “anti-immigrant rhetoric”.
“If you look at some of the memes that he’s using with the wall stuff at the moment, it’s astonishing, quite the level of vitriol that it has created,” she added.
Her remarks have been dismissed by the Trump campaign, with spokesman Steven Cheung telling news website Politico: “Nobody knows who this random person is or cares what comes out of her mouth”. “Who is she and what does she do?” he added.
Asked by reporters whether he agreed with Eagle’s remarks, Sir Keir dodged the question, replying that responsibility for this summer’s riots, which had been fuelled by far-right sentiment, lay with “thugs”.
Harris’s Democrat party is more politically aligned with Sir Keir’s Labour, whilst the pair also share professional backgrounds as former public prosecutors.
But Labour has also been preparing for the possibility of another Trump presidency, with Foreign Secretary David Lammy meeting Trump campaign advisers and Republican members of Congress earlier this year.
Lammy has also made comments about Trump in the past that could cause diplomatic awkwardness if the former president returns to power.
Back in 2018, Lammy called the former US president “a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathizing sociopath” and a “profound threat to the international order”.
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