Russian MP Slutsky barred from UNGA trip for third consecutive year

Leonid Slutsky, chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs, announced that he was the only member of the Russian delegation who was denied a visa by the United States to attend the session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. 

“Today, dear colleagues, our delegation, led by Sergei Viktorovich Lavrov, is flying to the UN General Assembly session. I am the only one of the five members of the delegation who has not been granted a visa for the third year in a row,” Slutsky said, according to Russian media.

He pointed out that although the United States now has a different president, the State Department continues the same practice, which, in his view, violates the agreement dating back to the late 1940s that established New York as the permanent headquarters of the UN.

The 80th session of the UN General Assembly opened on September 9. The high-level week, during which heads of state and government gather, will take place on September 23-27 and  September 29. Russia will be represented by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, whose address is scheduled for September 27.

The composition of the Russian delegation, headed by Lavrov, was approved in August by President Vladimir Putin. The delegation includes Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin, the heads of the parliamentary committees on international affairs, Grigory Karasin and Leonid Slutsky, as well as Russia’s permanent representative to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya.

By Tamilla Hasanova