United Nations (AP) – Linda Thomas-Greenfield takes over as US ambassador to the United Nations on Thursday and a senior Russian diplomat said the red carpet will be launched and Moscow is ready to work with the Biden administration – but “it takes involvement of both. “
Following her inauguration on Wednesday by Vice President Kamala Harris, Thomas-Greenfield headed to New York, where she is scheduled to present her credentials to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday afternoon.
She will jump straight into her new job, addressing global peace and security issues with Russia, China and dozens of other countries as the United States takes over the rotating presidency of the powerful UN Security Council. And he may even decide to attend a board meeting on Friday.
“We look forward to interacting with her,” Russia’s UN Deputy Ambassador Dmitry Polyansky said on Wednesday. “You can count on the most favorable attitudes and positive emotions towards her, as a member of our family on the Security Council.”
Noting the decades of Thomas-Greenfield as an American diplomat, he said that “it is always easier to interact with professionals.”
He said, however, that America’s view that Russia is “an enemy” and “a threat” has not changed under Biden, so it is very difficult to imagine how interaction with us could change with such starting points. of the positions of the new administration. ”
However, Polyansky said, “there are a lot of things that Russia and the United States can do together” and “we will judge the new administration by what it does.”
“We are in favor of cooperation,” he said. But “it takes two for tango and we are really ready to dance, but we need a good and reliable partner who knows all the movements and who respects us” as a country with certain positions, “does not consider us a threat ”And sees“ our national interests evident in many issues ”.
Thomas-Greenfield, a 35-year retired veteran of the US foreign service who became assistant secretary of state for Africa, resigned during the Trump administration. She will be the third African-American and the second African-American woman to hold the UN post.
Her confirmation on Tuesday was hailed by Democrats and United Nations supporters, who lamented former President Donald Trump’s unilateral approach to international affairs and welcomed President Joe Biden’s return to multilateralism.
At the Senate hearing on his nomination, Thomas-Greenfield called China a “strategic opponent” that threatens the world and called a speech he gave in 2019 that praised China’s initiatives in Africa but made no mention of its human rights abuses as a mistake.
The Senate voted 78-20 to confirm it with Republican opponents saying it is passionate about China and will not uphold US principles at the UN
Thomas-Greenfield said at the meeting that Washington will work not only with the Allies “but also to see where we can find a common ground with the Russians and the Chinese to put more pressure on the Iranians to push them back in strict accordance” with the 2015 agreement to restrict their nuclear program. Trump pulled the US out of the deal in 2018 and Biden indicated that the US will join, although how that might happen remains a major question.
Polyansky said Russia welcomed the “positive developments” in the Iranian nuclear deal and the US agreement to extend the START nuclear deal, adding that Moscow was ready for serious and meaningful talks “primarily in the area of strategic stability.”
Thomas-Greenfield stressed at the meeting that the US will re-enter the international arena and promote American values - “support for democracy, respect for universal human rights and the promotion of peace and security.”
Louis Charbonneau, director of the United Nations Human Rights Watch, told the Associated Press that Thomas-Greenfield should promote human rights as “a top priority.”
“He should abandon the Trump administration’s selective approach to human rights – enthusiastically condemning the abuses of his enemies, while ignoring violations of the rights of allies such as Israel and Saudi Arabia,” he said.
“But there is room for continuity in China and Syria,” Charbonneau said. “It should make the expansion of the coalition of nations willing to speak out against human rights abuses in Beijing one of its main goals at the UN, above all to try to bring African, Asian and Latin American states. And it should continue to push for the expansion of humanitarian access to all parts of Syria. ”