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KYIV: No matter how national elections turn out around the world this year, the UN General Assembly will continue to defend Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, the body’s president declared on Wednesday, adding that “no country has the right to invade another country.”
President of the General Assembly Dennis Francis told The Associated Press on his first visit to Ukraine that this position “cannot change because this is a matter of law” while Kyiv’s military fights Russia’s invasion for a third year.
Francis stated that efforts to preserve Ukraine’s sovereignty had received broad backing from the UN’s principal policy-making body.
However, elections in the US and a few other important EU member states this year have sparked worries about a possible change in strategy among Western countries whose armed forces and
“The effects of the election results on the entire world system, and specifically on the state of Ukraine, will be something we have to observe over time, according to Francis.
He declared, “I am confident that the Ukrainian people will not give up,” regardless of the results of the election. “They refuse to acknowledge it and will not consent to foreign rule over their country.”
Francis spoke in Kyiv following a two-day journey, urging Russia “to withdraw immediately all its military forces from the territory of Ukraine,” referring to a resolution that the General Assembly had just voted on shortly after the conflict started. More than two years later, the Moscow army is progressively annexing new land in eastern Ukraine.
Francis discussed peace and global security with Volodymyr Zelensky and other Ukrainian politicians. He promised to back Zelensky’s peace plan, which was the subject of a recent international conference in Switzerland that was attended by a large number of nations and organizations, including the UN.
“I think there are many important elements in Zelensky’s plan that can provide a foundation for dialog when that time is appropriate,” he said. “Let us see where it takes us.”