Invoking one of the UN Charterâs most fundamental principlesâthe prohibition of force against the territorial integrity and political independence of any StateâUN SecretaryâGeneral AntĂłnio Guterres delivered an unambiguous message to the Security Council: the international system must hold the line.
Addressing the Council through UnderâSecretaryâGeneral Rosemary DiCarlo, Guterres said the body was meeting âat a grave timeâ following the 3 January U.S. military intervention in Venezuela and the seizure of President NicolĂĄs Maduro. He stressed that the moment demanded âfull respectâ for the UN Charter, warning that the operation risked intensifying instability across the region.
The SecretaryâGeneral has repeatedly voiced alarm over the escalation, describing the U.S. action as a âdangerous precedentâ and expressing deep concern that core rules of international law had not been upheld. His remarks underscored a broader anxiety within the UN system: that unilateral military operationsâregardless of the political contextâerode the legal foundations designed to prevent conflict.
Guterresâ intervention signals a renewed push for adherence to international norms at a time when geopolitical tensions are rising and the boundaries of acceptable state conduct are increasingly contested. By grounding his warning in the Charter itself, the SecretaryâGeneral positioned the crisis not only as a regional emergency but as a test of the global commitment to the rule of law.
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