Russian ambassador: EU, US action on Belarus unwarranted

Russia's U.N. Ambassador said Saturday the United States and the European Union are taking the wrong action in response to the disputed election in Belarus.

Photo: Russian ambassador: EU, US action on Belarus unwarranted

Russia's Ambassador to the U.N. Andrey Denisov also characterized as "fiction" reports that Russia provided information to Saddam Hussein's regime on U.S. troop movements and plans during the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Denisov and China's deputy U.N. Ambassador Zhang Yishan delivered remarks at New York's Lehman College.

Denisov also said he is averse to looking at issues from a singular perspective, noting that today's global problems require collective approaches.

"Ideological-driven approaches to international relations attempts to impose one's own cultural and social standards on others," Denisov said.

Following the program, Denisov cited Belarus as an example of that imposition, where protests have erupted in the wake of the disputed election that extended the rule of the country's hard-line President Alexander Lukashenko.

The European Union and the United States said Friday they would impose sanctions on Lukashenko, who they say has turned Belarus into Europe's last dictatorship. Both called for an immediate end to the crackdown on the opposition.

"I think it's not a good way to bring people closer to a democratic standard," Denisov said of action taken against Belarus. "We have such a long record in Russia of totalitarian control that have a kind of allergy when we see such attempts, even if they come from good intentions", reports AP.

O.Ch.