According to Permanent Representative of the Syrian Arab Republic to the UN, Bashar Jaafari, a US-led coalition has damaged Syria’s oil and gas infrastructure in the amount of at least $2 billion.
Photo: European Pressphoto Agency
A US-led coalition, which is officially fighting against the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group, has damaged Syria’s oil and gas industry in the amount of $2 billion, Permanent Representative of the Syrian Arab Republic to the United Nations (UN), Bashar Jaafari, said.
Speaking at a meeting of the UN Security Council, the diplomat stressed that initially the coalition “was formed without an approval from the UN and the Syrian government.”
“It [the coalition] began to strike at innocent civilians in Syria and infrastructure, such as roads, bridges, factories, schools and hospitals,” Jaafari said. According to him, the amount of damage caused to Syrian oil and gas facilities during actions of the coalition, made up of at least US $2 billion.
In addition, the diplomat announced that damage caused by destruction of a thermal electric power station in the area of Aleppo in October last year, as a result of strikes of the international coalition, amounted to €1.2 million.
Earlier Tuesday, it was reported that during a meeting of the UN Security Council dedicated to a humanitarian situation in Syria, accusations rained down on the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS). In response, Russia’s permanent representative to the UN, Vitaly Churkin, advised the US-led coalition to “look in the mirror more often”, but not distribute “provocative insinuations,” concerning the Russian VKS’s operations in Syria, in the UN Security Council.