UN Chief Seeks to Solve Russian Delegates’ Visa Problem through Dialogue with US

TEHRAN (defapress) – UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is concerned over the situation with the US failure to issue visas to Russian delegates and is working on solving it, his spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters.

News ID: 80356

Date: 28 February 2020 - 20:29

"The issue of non-issuance of visas, of stringent travel restrictions on representatives of certain Member States is an issue that’s of great concern to the Secretary General, and I think he’s expressed it himself directly here in the press conference not too long ago," Dujarric said.

"Both the Secretary General and his Legal Counsel continue to raise those concerns with senior host country Government officials in trying to seek a resolution to the issue," he said, noting that the number of visa denials was high.

The UN General Assembly’s Committee on Relations with the Host Country held a meeting earlier this week. A source in the Russian mission told TASS that Moscow had directly asked the UN to bring the problem of non-issuance of visas to the arbitration between the US and the international organization.

The problems with issuing US visas have become a regular obstacle for holding events at the UN headquarters. Since the 74th session of the UN General Assembly, more than 20 Russian delegates have not received US visas, including those who planned to take part in the High-level week events in September.

In particular, the head of Russia’s delegation to the session of the UN Disarmament Commission Konstantin Vorontsov has not received a US visa. As a result, the session was postponed for ten days until February 27 and the event could be canceled unless the situation changes.

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