Russia has requested an emergency meeting of the Security Council because of the US air strikes in Syria and Iraq. According to media reports, the highest UN body is scheduled to meet on Monday on the issue.
According to media reports, the UN Security Council will meet on Monday at Russia’s request for an emergency meeting regarding the US air strikes in Syria and Iraq. According to diplomatic circles, the meeting of the most powerful UN body is scheduled for 10 p.m. CET. This is reported by the news agencies dpa and AFP.
Russia had previously announced that it had requested an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council. “We have just called for an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council due to the threat to peace and security posed by US attacks on Syria and Iraq,” said Russian Deputy Ambassador to the UN Dmitry Polyansky.
The Russian Foreign Ministry in Moscow had said: “Washington, confident of its impunity, continues its sowing of chaos and destruction in the Middle East.” The State Department added that it “strongly condemned” the attacks.
Information on fatalities
At least 39 people were killed in the attacks in Iraq and Syria, activists and officials said. An Iraqi government spokesman said there were also civilians among the 16 deaths in Iraq. He didn’t give a number. There were also 36 injuries and damage to residential buildings and private property.
According to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, at least 23 members of pro-Iranian militias have been killed in Syria.
Conflict parties as a source
In the current situation, information on the course of the war, shelling and casualties provided by the Palestinian and Israeli conflict parties cannot be directly verified by an independent body.
Retaliatory attacks after the death of three US soldiers
The US military said it attacked more than 85 targets in Syria and Iraq on Saturday night that are linked to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and militias they support. The US was reacting to the violent death of three US soldiers who were killed a week ago in Jordan near the border with Syria.
The government in Washington blames radical militias supported by Iran. Since mid-October there have been more than 165 attacks on bases in Iraq, Syria and Jordan where soldiers of the US Army and its allies are stationed.
The aim now is to reduce the ability of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and its allies in the region to carry out further attacks on US forces, said the communications director of the US National Security Council, John Kirby. President Joe Biden announced that US retaliatory attacks would continue in due course.
According to the US, the attacks were directed against pro-Iranian targets in Iraq and Syria. Local media reported that in Iraq, positions in Al Qaim and the command center of the pro-Iranian Popular Mobilization Units on the border with Syria were hit.
Iran: “Strategic mistake”
Criticism of the US attacks came from Iran. They violated the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the two countries, explains Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani. The attacks represented “another adventurous and strategic blunder by the United States that will only lead to increased tension and instability in the region.”
The spokesman accused the USA of trying to cover up Israeli war crimes in Gaza. This is a “strategic miscalculation” by the US government and will only draw Washington further into the conflict between Israel and Palestine.