AG百家乐在线官网

Sergei Lavrov is not one to to be distracted.聽

Sudan may be descending into a war that could "engulf the whole region", in the words of the UN secretary-general, and Ukraine's war is wrecking the world economy.

But instead the Russian foreign minister chose the moment to deliver a long rant about multilateralism.

There are 15 members of the UN Security Council and each member has the rotating presidency for a month.

Ukraine war latest: Leaked documents reveal Kyiv's plan for 'major attack on Moscow'

Russia had it 15 months ago, when the news broke it had invaded Ukraine, during a live council session its diplomats were chairing. And it now has it again.

Ukraine says that is a sick April Fools' joke. The UN Security Council should be dissolved rather than host the obscene spectacle of its aggressor nation presiding over a body whose entire raison d'etre is to preserve global peace and security.

Sergei Lavrov used to be respected, albeit grudgingly, in the world's chancelleries. A bruising silverback of a diplomat in contrast to some of the more softly spoken of his counterparts. That high esteem is now all but gone.

He has lied with astonishing cynicism about his country's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

He insisted Russia would never invade Ukraine, then, once they had, insisted that they were not. And last month he reduced an audience in Delhi to helpless laughter when he said Ukraine had launched the war against Russia.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

0:40

He said it all without a trace of irony - and with a deadpan delivery that the late Barry Humphries would have been proud of.

Lavrov growled his way through what we were promised would be a discussion on a "new multipolar world order based on sovereign equality and self determination".

Interesting topics for the envoy of a country that has shown such callous disregard for any of that when it's come to Ukraine.

Russia has driven a cavalry and an entire fleet of carriages through the UN charter with its invasion. Its attack on its neighbour is incompatible with almost every one of the organisation's clauses.

But that is not really the point for Mr Lavrov.

He wanted to use the UN pulpit to try to win the support or at least acquiescence of nations still sitting on the fence over the ill-fated invasion, whether that means abstaining in UN votes on the conflict or helping efforts to circumvent sanctions.

Read our special report:
Taken at gunpoint - how 15 Ukrainian orphans escaped Russia

Russia complains the world has become unipolar since the end of the Cold War.

If Moscow really wants a more multipolar world the best place to start might be the UN and yet it has acted with wanton disregard for its principles for more than a decade now.

In the conflict in Syria it abused its power of veto at the UN to block every effort to rein in its murderous client the Assad regime and there is plenty of evidence Russian warplanes bombed both medical facilities and even a UN aid convoy.

And there is nothing unipolar about 141 UN members condemning Russia in the last vote at the UN and ordering it to withdraw from Ukraine.