Foreign Ministry: British, Australian and French military measures against Syria violate UN Charter

 Syria dismissed the military measures which Britain, Australia and France have taken against it as being based on deliberate twisting of Article 51 of the UN Charter.

The Foreign and Expatriates Ministry sent two letters to the UN Secretary General and the Security Council’s Chairman, criticizing the violation of the UN Charter and the Security Council’s resolutions no. 2170, 2178 and 2199 practiced by the three countries in taking these measures, SANA reported.

The letters made it clear that the decision to take such measures “grossly contravenes” the UN Charter and namely Article 51 which provides that “Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security.”

They showed that Britain, Australia and France tended to take military measures against Syria under the claims that they were meeting Iraq’s demand and supporting its collective self-defense efforts.

The letters expressed the Syrian government’s wonder how countries, some of which are UN permanent members, would dare misinterpret the UN Charter into distorting the meaning of Article 51 in a way that could lead to spreading chaos and wars in the world.

The Foreign Ministry affirmed that any armed presence of any country on the Syrian land or in its sea or air space practiced without the Syrian government’s approval under the pretext of fighting terrorism would be a violation of Syria’s sovereignty.

Combating terrorism on the ground, it said, requires cooperation and close coordination with the Syrian government to implement the Security Council’s relevant counterterrorism resolutions, especially that the Syrian Arab Army has been for more than four years undauntedly confronting terrorism and the terrorist groups like ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra, acting upon its constitutional duties and under the government’s commission.

It added that what the Syrian army has achieved in its fight against those and other terrorist organizations “belies the ridiculous and false remarks” that particularly came in Australia’s letter, referring also to the failure of the US-led international coalition that “has until now yielded nothing tangible” in the war against these organizations, but rather allowed ISIS and its affiliates to grow and spread freely.

The British, Australian and French governments, the letters said, should rather stop sending terrorists and extremists to Syria and providing logistic and media support to them if they really want to fight terrorism.