U.S. Department of State Spokesperson Joshua Baker, participating in UN General Assembly in New York, told in the interview to Voice of America’s Russian Service about major issues, included into US delegation agenda. Among pressing issues are the fight against terrorism, extremism spreading, maintenance of peace and security. As Barak Obama emphasized in his speech, these problems cannot be solved without UNO participation; that is why the United States will further support this organization as well as other international institutes. The US President is confident that only with their help it is possible to achieve political settlement in such hot spots as Lebanon, Syria and Ukraine.
As one of the main topics of the General Assembly Joshua Baker called the refugee issue, which was discussed on the yesterday’s summit with participation of Obama. USA reported about the intention to increase the number of accepted refugees up to 147 thousand people amid the active discussion inside the United States. The Department of State Spokesperson does not see any problem in realization of this initiative in “immigrant’s country”. The main thing is to organize thorough check of these refugees before they get to US territory, Baker considers. According to him, USA, being the largest donor of humanitarian aid in Syria, Iraq and the Middle East, cannot just keep out of this problem.
As Joshua Baker confessed, the situation in Syria is discussed at UN General Assembly as the priority. It was raised both at bilateral meetings of the U.S. Secretary of State and during Syrian Support Group session. It is entirely possible that this week there will be one more meeting of John Kerry and Sergei Lavrov, dedicated to Syria.
The U.S. Department of State Spokesperson also commented on the elections to the State Duma of Russia, which were held on Sunday. He stated again that the United States do not recognize Duma’s elections, held in the Crimea, because they consider the Crimea to be the part of Ukrainian territory. As US Vice President Joe Biden noted at the meeting with Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko, the USA will remain an unchangeable partner of Ukraine and will continue to provide financial, political and other support, expecting that Ukraine will fulfill Minsk agreements.
In the meantime, Joshua Baker noted, the question of “lethal arms” supplies to Ukraine is not debated at a high political level. The USA aims at ensuring political settlement in Ukraine and continues undertaking measures in this regard through its European partners and within the Norman format.
