US Envoy Blasts ‘Deplorable’ Russia, China for Blocking Syria Resolution

Russia Warns Resolution Would've Moved Toward External Military Involvement

US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice expressed her usual level of “outrage” today at Russia and China for vetoing the latest in a long line of Western resolutions threatening sanctions and other unspecified UN actions against Syria if the government failed to halt all violence in the country.

Rice termed the veto “deplorable,” and said that it proved the UN Security Council was a failure. She went on to say that Russia and China were “outliers” and that the will of the international community was to impose regime change on Syria.

Her Russian counterpart, Vitaly Churkin, that there had been no point in proposing the bill in the first place, because it clearly had no chance of passing. Churkin added that the resolution was a move toward “external military involvement” in the ongoing Syrian Civil War, something Russia vehemently opposes.

Chinese officials expressed a similar sentiment, saying they were “concerned” about the ongoing violence but did not want to see the international community try to impose a settlement on Syria, a key trading partner.

This leaves open the question of what will happen to the UN ceasefire monitoring group, which has been in a sort of limbo since the Western-backed rebels abandoned the ceasefire weeks ago. Their official mandate expires Friday, and while Russia expressed support for an extension, Western nations have been keen to declare the monitoring mission dead from the start, hoping to parlay its failure into more international support for intervention.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.