Geneva-Sana
Ambassador Hossam Eldin Ala, Permanent Representative of the Syrian Arab Republic to the United Nations Office and International Organizations in Geneva, called on the mechanisms of the Human Rights Council to get out of the state of dependence on the pressure of Western countries in support of imposing unilateral coercive measures on states and breaking the cycle of unacceptable silence in their statements and reports.
Ambassador Ala explained during the high-level seminar on the negative effects of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of all human rights, including the right to development, that since 2011 Syria has been exposed to a wide range of unilateral coercive measures imposed by the United States, the European Union and their allies, which affected vital economic, service and livelihood sectors. The living conditions of the Syrian people.
He noted that in his report to the Council in September 2018, the Special Rapporteur, Driss Jazaeri, described the coercive measures imposed on the Syrian Arab Republic as violating the Charter of the United Nations, international humanitarian law and the fundamental rights of the Syrian citizen, including his right to food and health, and exacerbated his human suffering.
Ambassador Ala pointed out that the report pointed out that the extensive humanitarian damage caused by coercive measures denies all the claims that were made to impose them. With the failure of the war on Syria, Western coercive measures have recently reached the level of economic war and siege to deprive the Syrian people of the basics of life, including heating oil and life-saving medicines. The milk of children reached the point of practicing economic terrorism by threatening to include individuals and companies participating in the Damascus International Fair on the sanctions lists.
Ambassador Ala expressed Syria's welcome to the work of the Algerian Special Rapporteur to identify and develop elements of a declaration by the UN General Assembly on the negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of all human rights, including the right to development, stressing that consensus on its adoption could constitute an approach towards International equilibrium and addressing the threats to multilateralism in international relations leading to the abolition of these measures that violate the Charter of the United Nations and the rules of international law.
He noted that the steady increase in the number of States targeted by unilateral coercive measures imposed by the United States, the European Union and their allies and the expansion of measures beyond the national borders of States to the threat of sanctions by third parties to compel them to comply with those unlawful measures and submit to the interests of their sponsoring States and their foreign policies Legal and political and ethical concerns that different UN bodies must address and contribute to reducing their negative impact on a wide range of human rights, including the right to life.
The imposition of coercive economic measures that were detrimental to the livelihood of the citizens of the target countries was a practice that was contrary to the letter and spirit of the Charter of the United Nations and to the human rights obligations of States because of the repercussions of their extraterritorial boundaries and the fundamental human rights of the citizens of the target country.
Ambassador Ala considered it ironic that the imposition of coercive measures was justified under the pretext of protecting human rights when starvation of the peoples of the target States was a means of bringing them to their knees.
