UN Secretary General ‘turns blind eye’ to US visa delays for Russian diplomats – Moscow

Russia and the US have been engaged in a heated visa dispute for several months already. Moscow says that the Russian officials scheduled to take up their posts at the UN headquarters in New York, and particularly at the UN Secretariat, can’t assume their duties because Washington delays their applications processing for an indefinite period.

Those Russians, who already work at the UN are forced to quit their jobs as their American visas are not extended, the foreign ministry said, labeling such actions as nothing less than “sabotage.” According to the ministry, the Russian military officials, who were appointed to their positions within the relevant departments of the Secretariat by the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres himself, “have to wait for their US visas for months” and sometimes even for “more than a year.”

Americans exploit this sort of ‘administrative pressure’ in their ‘unfair competition’ to force Russians from certain posts and putting their own military into these positions.

In its Wednesday statement, the ministry also slammed Guterres for his supposed inaction in the face of the American malpractice, by accusing him of “clearly turning a blind eye” to the violation of the UN Charter by the US.

The visa debate has added further strain to the already rocky relations between Moscow and Washington. Yet, no progress in resolving this issue has been made so far. Earlier, in December, Moscow’s envoy to the UN Vasily Nebenzya raised this issue with the US President Donald Trump, as he was given a tour of the White House.Trump said that he was not aware of the situation and vowed to “deal with it.”