On Wednesday, Secretary of State John Kerry tore into the Russian government during remarks to the United Nations Security Council, speaking of the bombing of a U.N. aid convoy that killed more than 20 people. Kerry spoke immediately after Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
“I listened to my colleague from Russia and I sort of felt like we’re in a parallel universe here,” Kerry said of Lavrov’s account of the war. The highest ranking U.S. diplomat wondered aloud how U.S.-led coalition forces could be expected to negotiate with Russia if they couldn’t keep their Syrian allies in check for a week-long ceasefire.
“How can people go sit at a table with a regime that bombs hospitals and drops chlorine gas again and again and again and again and again and acts with impunity,” Kerry asked. “You’re supposed to sit there and have happy talk in Geneva while the regime drops bombs?”
Russia has repeatedly claimed it was not responsible for Tuesday’s attacks, which effectively ended the ceasefire and forced the U.N. to suspend all aid to the region. Kerry scoffed at the Kremlin’s excuses. “The trucks and the food and the medicine just spontaneously combusted,” the secretary of state said. “Anybody here believe that?”
“There are only two countries that have planes that are flying during the night or flying in that particular area at all,” Kerry said. “They are Russia and Syria.” He added that bombing attacks on hospitals and children are “flagrant violations of international law.”
You can watch Kerry’s full U.N. speech on Syria below.
(Via CNN)