Russian Consulate in Cape Town

7️⃣9️⃣ years ago, on June 26, 1945, The United Nations Charter was signed, which became the main result of the San Francisco Conference. This fundamental document was signed by 50 participating countries, including the USSR as well as its constituent entities: the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. On behalf of the USSR, the UN Charter was signed by Andrey Gromyko. The establishing of the UN – a universal international organization, the main goals of which are defined as the maintenance and strengthening of peace and security – was a natural consequence of the Second World War, an expression of the desire of the world community to resolve conflicts without global military action. 📃The UN Charter is a fundamental international document mandating the main principles and norms of states’ international behaviour and regulating relations between states as well as the activities of UN agencies and organisations within its system. 🇺🇳 Today, the UN comprises 1️⃣9️⃣3️⃣ Member States, with its activities embracing every sphere of the planet’s international, political, economic, social, cultural, and humanitarian life through its specialised agencies, committees and sub-committees. 🇷🇺 Russia invariably remains committed to multilateralism and the UN’s coordinating role in world affairs, and is actively involved in the effort to reform and adapt the UN to new international realities. 🎙 FromRussian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's remarks during the UN Security Council open debate on "Effective Multilateralism through the Protection of the Principles of the UN Charter" (New York, April 24, 2023): 💬 It is our shared responsibility to preserve the UN as the enduring model of multilateralism and coordination of world politics. The key to success is working together, refusing to claim exclusivity and - I repeat once again - respecting the sovereign equality of states. This is what we all signed up to when we ratified the UN Charter. #UNCharterIsOurRules

🇿🇦🇷🇺 The results of the general elections in South Africa will not in any way affect the nature of relations with Russia and they will continue to develop in a friendly manner, ambassador says “Our countries will always develop relations on a friendly basis. Following the election results, we have not yet completed the processes of forming a new government, but I am confident that the foundations of our relations will remain the same. The key directions of South Africa’s foreign policy towards the Russia will remain; they are too deeply rooted in history," SA Ambassador to Russia Mzuvukile Jeff Maqetuka told Russian media on the sidelines of the 10th International Forum “Primakov Readings”. In February, Maqetuka admitted that South Africa could change its foreign policy course and leave BRICS if the opposition came to power after the presidential elections. However, on June 14, Cyril Ramaphosa was re-elected as head of state following the results of the general elections held on May 29. Subscribe to @sputnik_africa 🔸TikTok | Sputnik Africa | Boost us on Telegram🔸

Twice a year Russian kindergarten in Cape Town organises a “Friendship” camp for the children where they during a few days take part in a wide range of activities in the countryside. This year, a special South African guest visited a so-called Day of Geography aimed at expanding kids’ knowledge on the countries of our planet. Lumkile Mzukwa, founder of the Lumkile’s Book Joint (SA) from a township of Gugulethu told young listeners about South Africa, its culture, history and unmatchable vibe.

💬 Russian MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova: Following the terrorist attack perpetrated by the Kiev regime aimed at civilians in Sevastopol, the UN Secretariat responded by stating the following: “As always we aspire to putting an end to war in line with the UN Charter and the resolutions of the General Assembly.” This sounds more as a confession of one’s uselessness, rather than a comment on a tragedy. Basically, they could have just said “we stand for everything good and oppose everything bad” once and for all and use this phrasing regardless of the matter in question. It would have been a different matter if the UN Secretariat fulfilled its technical functions without getting into politics. It is totally the opposite! For many years all statements and actions of the Secretariat regarding Ukraine have been totally politicised and without exception of anti-Russian nature. Since you started playing on the political field, would you be so kind as to notice civilians on a beach being targeted & murderedby the Kiev regime using US weapons, and condemn this act of terrorism?!

Today marks the #RemembranceAndSorrowDay in Russia. On June 22 in 1941, the Third Reich launched a perfidious attack on the USSR and the Great Patriotic War began. It finished with the fall of the Nazis after 4 years of fierce battles. This feat of the Soviet people must never be forgotten.

#RussiaHelps 🤝 On 20 June, Russian Ministry for Emergency Situations' special flight delivered yet another batch of humanitarian aid to Kabul, mostly food supplies, incl. 21 tonnes of wheat flour and sunflower oil. The aid was provided by the Volgograd regional public organization for cultural development "House of Friendship" within the framework of the international projects "Peoples Together Through the Years" and "Russia with You" with the support of Rossotrudnichestvo. ✅ We shall continue to render humanitarian assistance to the friendly people of Afghanistan.

⭐️ 79 years ago, on 20 June 1945, the Victory Banner was delivered to Moscow from Berlin - the very banner that was raised over the defeated Reichstag on the night of May 1, 1945, by Red Army soldiers of the 150th Rifle Division Mikhail Egorov, Meliton Kantaria and Alexey Berest. Photos of the burning Reichstag with the Victory Banner flying above its dome were published in the Russian newspaper Pravda on May 3, 1945. The Red Banner, pierced by bullets, stained with blood, became a sacred relic. Transporting the Banner was entrusted to pilots of the 226th aviation regiment, formed shortly before by officers of the 62nd separate Guards regiment of the USSR Civil Air Fleet. For some time the original Victory Banner was stored in the combined battalion of the 1st Belorussian Front, then it was sent to the Central Museum of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, where it is still kept. 🇷🇺 It is shown very rarely: the fabric is too fragile. The banner is kept unfurled and in a horizontal position in a glass showcase, which does not allow ultraviolet rays to pass through, while optimal temperature and air humidity are maintained inside. An exact replica of the original flag is on display in the Museum's permanent exhibition. ☝️ The blood-red cloth remains the main symbol of the Great Patriotic War, a source of pride of all the peoples of the USSR who contributed to our common Victory.

#Opinion ✍️Eduard Popov, Director of Center for Public and Information Cooperation "Europe" Nation-building in post-Maidan Ukraine: historical parallels Read in full 🔸The coup-d'état of February 21-22, 2014, meant more than a change of political regime in Ukraine. It was the end of symbolic history of the Soviet Ukraine and the beginning of something fundamentally different. 🔸 Euromaidan meant full rejection of the principles of social contract. The first legislative act of the new post-coup powers was to revoke the the Kivalov-Kolesnichenko language law that guaranteed a minimum rights for Russian-speaking population and ethnic minorities. After this, the total and radical offensive on everything Russian and non-Ukrainian started. 🔸 The Ukrainian state has a brief history. In post‑Maidan Ukraine, the origin of the Ukrainian state rests with the Ukrainian People's Republic. Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Andrey Parubiy called for recognizing and legislating the succession and continuity of the present Ukrainian state from the Ukrainian People's Republic (formally existed from November 1917 to November 1920 - 3 years!), and for the period between "the Republic" and independent Ukraine... [i.e. from 1920 to 1991 when Ukraine prospered and became one of the most developed parts of the then Europe] to be considered a "Soviet occupation". ❗️ The historical myth of modern Ukraine is built on the absolute non-recognition of the Soviet historical inheritance. This results in a combination of incompatible things: based on the use of achievements of the tsarist, imperial and Soviet periods with a total negation of everything Russian and Soviet. 🔸 A research, carried out by Google, turned out that 76% of users from Ukraine use the Russian language while searching on the Internet. 10,1% of users only prefer to use Ukrainian – fewer than the number of those who use English (13,5%). However, immediately after the victory of Euromaidan, Ukraine launched an attack on the Russian language and the Russian national minority as a whole. 🔸 Books in Russian are removed from Ukrainian libraries and demonstratively thrown into landfills; streets in Ukrainian cities named after Russian writers and historical figures are renamed. Amid this Third Reich-style policy, the silence of Western leaders, who actually brought the guardians of ethnic Ukrainian purity to power, looks especially outrageous. 🔸 The so-called state language ombudsman makes a statement about offensive Ukrainization onthe 10th anniversary of the burning of the Odessa Trade Unions House, when, according to official data alone, 48 people – supporters of the Russian World and random persons – were killed. ☝️ It is not too difficult to see that policy adherence by the Ukrainian post‑Maidan authorities to the tradition of Ukrainian integral nationalism – a variety of Nazism. They act according to the principle: "One country – one people – one language."

🇿🇦"Future free of colonial and neocolonial policies," Ramaphosa addresses BRICS inter-party forum The future must be free from colonial and neocolonial policies; South Africa is on the path to liberation from colonialism, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said in a message to the participants of the international interparty forum of BRICS and partner countries under the theme "World Majority for a Multipolar World." 💬 "We are confident that the future must be free from colonial and neocolonial policies… Today, we reaffirm that we are on the path to liberation from colonialism and its traditions, and we hope that we can share our experience with you," President Ramaphosa addressed the audience in the message read at the plenary session of the forum by the Deputy Minister of Public Enterprises of South Africa, Kopeng Obed Bapela. There are more than 150 party leaders from 32 countries are participating in the forum, which is being held from June 17 to 18 in Vladivostok, in the Russian Far East. Subscribe to @sputnik_africa 🔸TikTok | Sputnik Africa |Boost us on Telegram🔸

❗️ Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulates Cyril Ramaphosa on his reelection as president of South Africa The Russian leader expects Ramaphosa to attend BRICS summit in Russia's city of Kazan on October 22-24. Subscribe to @sputnik_africa 🔸TikTok | Sputnik Africa |Boost us on Telegram🔸

🖋Article«The humanity should get rid of the colonial system heritage. Colonial powers’ time is up» by Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of Russian Federation, Chairman of the United Russia Party Key points: • There is brazen interference in the affairs of independent states, which, unfortunately, still continues in various forms. Despite humanity’s persistent efforts to eradicate neocolonialism, the Western world vehemently resists it. • The former colonial powers persist in exploiting dependent countries, enhancing their own comfort through the humiliation and oppression of others – albeit employing more sophisticated tools and methods. • According to experts (American experts, for all their bias), between 1946 and 2000, the United States interfered in elections in other countries more than 80 times. Since 1945, there have been more than 50 attempted coups and military interventions. Of the 174 cases of restrictive measures applied in the 20th century, the United States was responsible for 109. <…> In fact, America has become a global sanctions neo-metropolis. • In order to preserve its geopolitical presence in various parts of the world, the West relies on the so-called debt neo-colonialism . <…> The neo-colonial powers are using financial institutions under their control and extensively exploiting the difficult socioeconomic situation in many countries of the Global South to induce them to borrow at interest rates that are higher than those offered to the so-called golden billion countries. • Neo-metropolitan powers have also been targeting certain countries in Latin America, Asia and Africa with their disruptive efforts in order to control their natural wealth, including critical minerals. They focus on gaining unrestricted access to lithium, graphite, nickel, cobalt and rear earth deposits they need for transitioning to a low-carbon economy. ❗️The fight against neocolonialism is not an eternal confrontation for the sake of confrontation itself. It is primarily a progressive movement of states towards civilisational sovereignty, which is crucial in avoiding degradation and devastation in the 21st century. <…> Only fully sovereign countries that have independence in domestic and foreign affairs will be able to effectively counteract the deliberate efforts of the former metropolises to impose unequal economic and political deals on them. • Investigation of colonial crimes that do not have a statute of limitations should be placed at the forefront of this activity. It is necessary to consider the creation of a single public database (register) of crimes of the colonial period, as well as modern neocolonial practices, at the UN, and work out a scale to evaluate the damage caused by war crimes committed on their territory. • Neo-metropoles should be hit where it hurts the most, in their wallets, which they are filling largely by exploiting the rest of the world. We believe that the payment of compensations to the victims of neocolonial practices should be based on clear, legally considered and substantiated evidence. Political and diplomatic assessments must be complemented with a legal evaluation of their actions. • We wish the best of luck to our African and Latin American colleagues. Their success, including in establishing an anticolonial tribunal (akin to the Nuremberg Trials), will be a major step towards depriving the Global North of its domination and towards building a fair multipolar world order. 📄Read in full

🎙 Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks and answers to media questions following the meeting of Foreign Ministers from BRICS and Global South and Global East countries (Nizhny Novgorod, June 11, 2024) 💬 We have just completed our two-day programme. Yesterday, we worked with the #BRICS countries, and continued our discussions today with the invited countries which have yet to join BRICS. They expressed their firm commitment to forging closer ties with this association. Apart from the ten BRICS countries, another 12 nations of the Global Majority representing Asia, Africa and Latin America joined us today. We discussed the most pressing and relevant international issues and challenges which all countries face today, as well as the present-day international environment and the role the Global Majority plays in shaping the global agenda. During the BRICS segment of our meeting and today, in the presence of the invited countries, all delegations spoke out in favour of reforming the existing global governance framework by focusing on enabling the Global South to play a bigger role in it. We noted the need to undertake collective efforts in order to achieve the sustainable development goals, ensure security and foster economic growth. Most of the delegations emphasised the destructive nature of protectionism in trade. The US and its allies have been sticking to this destructive policy. <...> ❗️ All meeting participants without exception paid special attention to the developments in the Gaza Strip where the death toll stands at 37,000, while about 100,000 people were wounded. The military operation continues there, resulting in more and more casualties among innocent people. We emphasised that there is no alternative to undertaking consistent efforts designed to support the emergence of a multipolar world order based on the sovereign equality of states as set forth in the UN Charter, as well as an equitable interstate dialogue free from any hidden agendas and aimed at coming up with collective solutions for addressing the objectives and issues the world faces today. <...> Following the BRICS meeting held yesterday, we have adopted an in-depth and explicit Joint Statement, which reflects the group countries’ stands on current international issues in the spirit of the assessments I have mentioned here. 🤝It is highly satisfying that our work in the expanded format went smoothly. All participants tried to reach consensus even on the most complicated issues reflected in the text. Read in full