UN Security Council President (Russia) on Syria and other topics - Press Conference (28 June 2018)

Press Conference by Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia, Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the United Nations and President of the Security Council for the month of June.
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The Russian Ambassador Vassily Alekseevich Nebenzia today called the decision on strengthening OPCW’s mandate on assigning responsibility for chemical weapon attacks “a bad move”, adding that it will not bring parties to consensus and “will have a mark on the political discussion on Syria.”
The Russian Ambassador to the UN Vassily Alekseevich Nebenzia briefed reporters today (28 Jun) as Russia is ending its Security Council presidency for the month of June.
Asked about the decision on allowing the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW)’s assigning accountability for chemical weapon attacks, the Russian Ambassador said “it will definitely affect” and “have a mark on the political discussion on Syria.”
He added “both the chemical thing and the humanitarian thing are just derivatives on the political settlement. They are not issues, of course they are important issues, and as you know, we condemn Assad, the use of such heinous weapons such as chemicals, anywhere, by anybody, but the way our partners chose to go about it leads us to the wrong direction.”
Nebenzia explained “we were opposing the idea from the start. We think it is a very bad idea to entrust the technical secretariat, technical in nature of the OPCW with an attributed functions. It is not fit for it, there are no provision in the convention for that. What is much more important is that it deprives all the legitimate bodies that can establish an attribute mechanism which is the Security Council. This is in that light, in a sense, as the president, it is a very bad development.”
Asked about the situation in Syria, the Russian Ambassador said that his country’s priority in Syria is a “political settlement”.
He added “because we do not believe in military solution like many other don’t. Now the process of political settlement has gained certain momentum, you know that President Assad, the Syrian Government presented to Staffan Mistura the list of their candidates to the constitutional commission, the fifty names which were demanded from them, now the ball is on the side of the opposition.”
Asked about the upcoming presidential meeting between Russia and the United States (US) in Helsinki, Finland on 16 July, Nebenzia said the meeting is “long overdue.”
The Russian Ambassador said “it is in a way, on one hand, the realization by the American administration that we indeed need to talk on many issues. This is not just a wish of the two countries, this is the wish of the world, as I said, it is not just needed for two of us, but for the rest of the world, because when we are in agreement of something, the rest of the world breathe better.”