(United Nations) Russia expressed concern in a letter to the Secretary General of the United Nations (UN) that it had not yet received any visa from the United States for the visit to the Assembly in September General of the United Nations of his delegation led by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, according to the text seen Friday by AFP.
Posted at 9:48 p.m.
“On the date of 1er September, none of the 56 Russian representatives […] has not received an entry visa for the United States” in the run-up to the General Assembly’s high-level week from September 20 to 26 in New York, writes Russian Ambassador to the UN Vassily Nebenzia in this letter addressed to Antonio Guterres. “The same situation exists for the journalists and the crew members of our minister’s flight”.
“It is all the more worrying that, in recent months, the American authorities have repeatedly refused to grant visas to a number of Russian delegates to participate in official UN events,” he said. it, calling on the United States to respect “its legal obligations” and to “promptly grant” the requested visas.
According to a 1947 agreement between the United States and the UN, the United States must not prevent the transit to the United Nations headquarters of representatives of member states.
In February, just after Russia invaded Ukraine, the United States announced sanctions against Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, including an entry ban.
“The United States takes seriously its obligations as a host country of the UN,” a spokesperson for the US State Department told AFP, noting that the visa granting process is confidential, it was not possible to comment on individual cases.
Given the large number of applications to be processed each year, “to ensure timely processing, we constantly remind the Russian mission to the UN, and other missions, that the United States must receive applications as soon as possible. soon as possible,” he added.
“This is particularly important because of Russia’s unjustified actions against our embassy in Russia”, which has limited staff and “our capacities to process visa applications”, he insisted.
A spokeswoman for the UN secretary general told AFP that he was “in close contact” with the United States regarding the rules of the 1947 agreement.
Antonio Guterres is in “preventive contact with the US mission regarding visas for delegations coming for meetings at UN headquarters” and “works with the mission on specific cases brought to our attention”, he said. -she adds. “That’s what we do in this case.”