By Elishya Perera
MONTRÉAL, Québec (CWBN)_During its final UN Security Council meeting, Germany appealed China to release the two Canadians detained in Beijing, for Christmas this year.
At the end of this month, Germany concludes its two-year term as a member of the Council, and the German Ambassador to the United Nations, Christoph Heusgen, plans to retire after more than 40 years as a diplomat.
“Let me end my tenure on the Security Council by appealing to my Chinese colleagues to ask Beijing for the release of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor. Christmas is the right moment for such a gesture,” Heusgen said.
Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig, known as the two Michaels, were arbitrarily detained by Chinese authorities in 2018, in apparent retaliation to the arrest of Meng Wanzhou, a Chinese Huawei official in Vancouver, on a US extradition request.
In response to Germany’s request, China’s deputy ambassador to the UN, Geng Shuang, accused Heusgen of launching “malicious” attacks against other members, “in an attempt to poison the working atmosphere.”
However, China was not the only member who expressed relief regarding Heusgen’s retirement.
During his address, the German ambassador also requested Russia’s deputy UN ambassador, Dmitry Polyanskiy, to read certain articles regarding the claims made by Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny, that he tricked a Russian secret agent to confess details of a botched plot to kill him.
Responding to these remarks, Polyanskiy noted that Russia is always criticised at meetings even if it is not relevant to the subject at hand. “It seems he’s developed a certain dependency on the council, there’s never a meeting without criticism of Russia even if that’s not suitable for the subject matter. I hope that after Jan. 1 that Christoph’s symptoms will improve,” he said.
Nevertheless, the Unites States expressed its gratitude towards the outgoing members of the council, for their commitment and willingness to speak the truth.
“I wanted to take just a moment to thank the five outgoing members of the Council today, Belgium, the Dominican Republic, Germany, Indonesia, and South Africa, for their work over the past two years,” the United States Deputy Ambassador to the UN, Richard Mills, said. “[…] these were five elected members who brought great commitment, a great willingness to speak truth on the Council, and every now and then, a bit of feistiness to the work, was true. And it has been a great pleasure for me to part of this for the last 60 days.”
