The Russian foreign ministry said yesterday a draft French UN Security Council resolution on Syria would have helped Islamist militants in the Aleppo area by protecting them from aerial bombing.

In a statement, the ministry also said the French text was politicised and one-sided.

Russia on Saturday vetoed the resolution, which demanded an end to air strikes on Aleppo and military over flights.

“An explicit attempt was made, by banning flights in the Aleppo area, to provide cover for the terrorists of Jabhat Al-Nusra and associated militants,” the ministry said.

A rival Russian draft text failed to get a minimum nine votes in favour. Moscow’s text removed the demand for an end to air strikes on Aleppo and put the focus back on a failed September 9th US/Russia ceasefire deal, which was annexed to the draft.

British UN ambassador Matthew Rycroft told Russian UN ambassador Vitaly Churkin: “Thanks to your actions today, Syrians will continue to lose their lives in Aleppo and beyond to Russian and Syrian bombing. Please stop now.”

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces, backed by Russian war planes and Iranian support, have been battling to capture eastern Aleppo, the rebel-held half of Syria’s largest city, where more than 250,000 civilians are trapped.

“Russia has become one of the chief purveyors of terror in Aleppo, using tactics more commonly associated with thugs than governments,” US deputy ambassador to the United Nations David Pressman told the council.

He said Russia was “intent on allowing the killing to continue and, indeed, participating in carrying it out” and that what was needed from Moscow was “less talk and more action from them to stop the slaughter.”

A UN resolution needs nine votes in favour and no vetoes to be adopted. The power of veto lies with the United States, France, Britain, Russia and China. The Russian text only received four votes in favour, so a veto was not needed to block it.

The French draft received 11 votes in favour, while China and Angola abstained. Venezuela joined Russia in voting against it. It was the fifth time Russia has used its veto on a UN resolution on Syria during the more than five-year conflict.

Meanwhile, Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said yesterday he had detected increasing US hostility towards Moscow and complained about what he said was a series of aggressive US steps that threatened Russia’s national security.

In an interview with Russian state television likely to worsen already poor relations with Washington, Lavrov blamed the Obama administration for what he described as a sharp deterioration in US-Russia ties.

“We have witnessed a fundamental change of circumstances when it comes to the aggressive Russophobia that now lies at the heart of US policy towards Russia,” Lavrov told First Channel TV. “It’s not just a rhetorical Russophobia, but aggressive steps that really hurt our national interests and pose a threat to our security.”

With relations between Moscow and Washington strained over issues from Syria to Ukraine, Lavrov reeled off a list of grievances against the US which he said had helped contribute to an atmosphere of mistrust that was in some ways more dangerous and unpredictable than the Cold War.

He said Nato had been steadily moving military infrastructure closer to Russia’s borders and lashed out at western sanctions imposed over Moscow’s role in the Ukraine crisis. </s> UNITED NATIONS -- Rival resolutions on Syria backed by the West and Russia were defeated Saturday in the U.N. Security Council, offering no relief to the besieged city of Aleppo and leaving the key powers even more divided over a course of action in the war-ravaged country.

Russia vetoed a French-drafted resolution demanding an immediate halt to the bombing campaign that the Syrian government and Russia are carrying out against rebel-held districts in Aleppo. The rival Russian draft, which made no mention of a bombing halt, was rejected because it failed to get the minimum nine yes votes needed for approval by the 15-member council.

Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, the current rotating council president, said before the votes that members were engaging in "one of the strangest spectacles" in the Security Council, because they were meeting knowing that neither resolution would be adopted.

"This waste of time is inadmissible," he said.

The votes reflected the deep divisions in the U.N.'s most powerful body, which is supposed to ensure international peace and security but has failed to take action to end the more than five-year Syrian conflict.

The French-backed resolution received 11 "yes" votes, two "no" votes from Russia and Venezuela, and abstentions from China and Angola. The Russian resolution received four "yes" votes, nine "no" votes, and two abstentions.

It was the fifth veto by Russia of a Western-backed resolution aimed at ending the Syrian conflict.

The Russian draft resolution called for a separation of moderate and extremist forces in Syria. Britain's U.N. Ambassador Matthew Rycroft called the resolution "a sham" that would do nothing to protect civilians from being killed in Aleppo.

Several diplomats said Russia's last-minute introduction of the rival resolution was meant to put a negative spotlight on both sides of the war in Syria. Instead of Russia being the lone veto on a resolution demanding an end to the bombing campaign by Syrian and Russian aircraft in Aleppo, now the Western powers have vetoed a resolution calling for a halt to fighting in that region.

France circulated its draft resolution a week ago, saying it wanted the council to unite behind it. But negotiations never got Russia on board, and French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault's visit to Moscow last week didn't, either.

Russia, a close Syria ally, has opposed any grounding of its warplanes, which have been supporting President Bashar Assad's military campaign.

Churkin called the French draft "very hastily put together."

"I frankly believe that this is designed not to make progress" in ending the current stalemate "but to cause a Russian veto," he told reporters after U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura briefed the Security Council in private Friday morning.

Churkin said it was "unprecedented" that the 15-member council would ask a permanent member to limit its activities, in this case requiring the Russian military to stop flights.

The French draft expresses the Security Council's intention to take "further measures" -- U.N. code for sanctions -- in the event that any party to the Syria conflict doesn't comply with its demands. There is no mention of this in the Russian text.

The Russian draft stressed "the urgent need to achieve and verify separating moderate forces from 'Jabhat Al-Nusra' as a key priority," referring to Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, the militant group formerly known as the Nusra Front.

Key powers are divided over the course of action in war-ravaged Aleppo, and Syria in general, even as UNICEF's representative in Syria warned that the violence was causing "dire" humanitarian and psychological effects on both sides of Aleppo.

U.N. agencies are on "standby" to deliver assistance to the divided city, Hanaa Singer of the U.N.'s children agency told The Associated Press.

Also on Saturday, Syrian state media outlets and a Syria monitoring group said pro-government troops advanced in a northern district of eastern Aleppo, wrestling control from rebel fighters in their latest push into the besieged area.

Singer said conditions in besieged Aleppo are "terribly dire," with hospitals hit, doctors overwhelmed, and more than 100 children killed in bombings since Sept. 19. Conditions for thousands of displaced in the government-held part of the city also are deteriorating, with some of them being displaced for up to six times in the past three years, she said.

Singer returned last week from a weeklong trip to the government-held part of Aleppo where she visited thousands of displaced Syrians. Most are crammed in makeshift shelters, mosques, parks and churches after recently fleeing clashes on the front line between rebels and pro-government forces. In one case, a mother so desperate from the continuous displacement stabbed her baby girl, thinking she will save her daughter the misery of living on handouts and without a home, Singer said.

Describing the situation for thousands of families living in shelters in government-controlled Aleppo, Singer said: "These [are] the horrors in western Aleppo. God knows what is happening [in the case of] mental health or the psychological situation on the eastern [rebel-held] side."

Western Aleppo, controlled by the government, is separated from eastern rebel-held Aleppo by a few yards, sometimes by a single plastic sheet or pockmarked building. An estimated 275,000 people are living in the rebel-held part of Aleppo, with no international aid reaching the area since the first week of July. Besides the scarce assistance, it is also difficult to assess the needs with the ever-evolving violent situation, and lack of access for international aid groups, she said.

"I think we all agree, and especially if you have been so close in the area there and seeing the dire situation in the west, hearing about the horrible situation in the east, all we need now is [for] the violence to stop," Singer said. "The violence has to stop, and once the violence stops, the U.N., we absolutely stand ready. We are ready. We are actually on standby."

Singer said U.N. plans are in place for government-held Aleppo to accommodate people who may evacuate the besieged part of the city if a cease-fire takes effect.

According to medical charity Doctors Without Borders, hospitals in the eastern side of Syria's Aleppo have been attacked 23 times since July, damaging all eight facilities that have not yet been shuttered or destroyed. Since the U.S.-Russian cease-fire broke down Sept. 19, the situation in besieged Aleppo has deteriorated under relentless bombardment. Water stations and civil-defense centers also have been hit, while more than 320 people have been killed in eastern Aleppo in nearly three weeks of violence.

"In eastern Aleppo, the situation is terribly dire," Singer said. "Lots of schools and of hospitals have been hit; we understand that there are only 30 doctors there. We have information that at least over 100 children have been killed. We hear that because of the lack of services and lack of health facilities that some children, that doctors can't cope with all the cases, and some children in dire situation are left to die."

Information for this article was contributed by Edith M. Lederer and Sarah El Deeb of The Associated Press. </s> Russian Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov, foreground, speaks at a briefing in the Defense Ministry in Moscow, Russia, on Friday, Oct. 7, 2016, with a montage in the background showing Secretary of State John Kerry shaking hands with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

UNITED NATIONS — Rival resolutions on Syria backed by the West and Russia were defeated in the U.N. Security Council on Saturday, offering no relief to the besieged city of Aleppo and the key powers even more divided over a course of action in the war-ravaged country.

Russia vetoed a French-drafted resolution demanding an immediate halt to the bombing campaign that the Syrian government and Russia are carrying out against rebel-held districts in Aleppo. The rival Russian draft which made no mention of a bombing halt was rejected because it failed to get the minimum nine "yes" votes needed for approval by the 15-member council.

Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, the current rotating council president, said before the votes that members were engaging in "one of the strangest spectacles" in the Security Council, because they were meeting knowing that neither resolution would be adopted.

"This waste of time is inadmissible," he said.

The votes reflected the deep divisions in the U.N.'s most powerful body which is charged with ensuring international peace and security but has totally failed to take action to end the more than 5-year Syrian conflict which has killed over 300,000 people and displaced millions.

The French-backed resolution received 11 "yes" votes, two "no" votes from Russia and Venezuela, and abstentions from China and Angola. The Russian resolution received four "yes" votes, nine "no" votes, and two abstentions.

It was the fifth veto by Russia of a Western-backed resolution aimed at ending the Syrian conflict.

When Syria's U.N. Ambassador Bashar Ja'afari started speaking, a number of ambassadors walked out, including the representatives of Britain, France, Ukraine and the United States.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, who addressed the session before the vote on the French resolution, warned that the continued bombing of Aleppo was killing civilians and destroying hospitals and schools — "and has nothing to do with combatting terrorism," as Syrian President Bashar Assad's government and its close ally Russia contend.

"It is the annihilation of Aleppo," he said, declaring that the continued bombing will leave the city in ruins, a place where citizens will be left to their "executioners."

He compared Aleppo's likely fate to Guernica during the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s, Srebrenica during the Bosnian war and the Chechen capital Grozny which was pummeled by the Russian army in the mid-1990s.

Russia's Churkin said the demand for a bombing halt in Aleppo was "not fleshed out" and would affect the government-controlled western part of the city as well as the rebel-held east.

He said the French resolution's adoption would have been the first where the Security Council decided on a course of action for a permanent council member without prior agreement — meaning that Russia would have been required to stop all flights and bombing of Aleppo.

Churkin noted that activity in Aleppo had gone down on Friday and "we hope this is a trend that will continue." </s> A general views shows a severely damaged street in the northwestern border town of al-Bab on February 24, 2017 after Turkish-backed rebels announced the capture of the town from the Islamic State (IS) group a day earlier (AFP Photo/Nazeer al-Khatib)

United Nations (United States) (AFP) - Russia and China on Tuesday vetoed a Western-backed UN resolution that would have imposed sanctions on Syria over chemical weapons use, in the first clash at the Security Council since US President Donald Trump took office.

The twin vetoes came as peace talks in Geneva showed no signs of progress on ending the nearly six-year war in Syria.

It was the seventh time that Russia, Syria's top military ally, has used its veto power to shield the Damascus regime. China has backed Moscow by using its veto six times on Syria.

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned ahead of the vote that imposing sanctions on Syria was "completely inappropriate" while talks were ongoing in Geneva on ending the war.

US Ambassador Nikki Haley shot back: "This resolution is very appropriate."

"It is a sad day on the Security Council when members start making excuses for other member states killing their own people."

"The world is definitely a more dangerous place," she told the council after the measure was rejected.

The resolution drafted by Britain, France and the United States won nine votes in favor, while three countries opposed it -- Bolivia, China and Russia. Egypt, Ethiopia and Kazakhstan abstained.

UN resolutions require nine positive votes and no veto to be adopted.

The resolution would have put 11 Syrians, mainly military commanders, and 10 entities linked to chemical attacks in 2014 and 2015 on a UN sanctions blacklist.

It included a ban on the sale of helicopters and of chemical agents to the Syrian armed forces or the government.

A UN-led investigation concluded in October that the Syrian air force had dropped chlorine barrel-bombs from helicopters on three opposition-held villages in 2014 and 2015.

French Ambassador Francois Delattre said the vote was a "moment of truth" for the council, arguing that chemical weapons use was a "negation of all civilization."

In Paris, French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault took aim at Russia, saying it bore a "heavy responsibility toward the Syrian people and humanity as a whole."

"The Security Council's own investigation has found attacks were committed by the Syrian regime and Daesh on the Syrian people. Despite support from the majority of the Security Council, Russia, along with China, has chosen to prevent action," Johnson said in a statement.

The joint panel by the UN and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) also found that Islamic State jihadists used mustard gas in an attack in 2015.

The vote marked the first major council action by the new Trump administration, which is seeking warmer ties with Russia.

The United States has backed rebel groups fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and leads a military coalition fighting the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.

Britain and France had circulated the proposed measure in December and the new US administration joined as a co-sponsor of the draft resolution this month, indicating that it was ready to confront Russia on Syria.

Russian Deputy Ambassador Vladimir Safronkov echoed Putin's view that imposing sanctions would have undermined peace talks and described the draft resolution as a "provocation" by the Western "troika".

Chinese Ambassador Liu Jieyi argued that sanctions were premature and that the UN-OPCW panel should be allowed to complete its investigations.

"At present, investigations are still ongoing and therefore it is too early to reach a final conclusion," Liu told the council.

Aside from China and Russia, Britain, France and the United States are the other veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council.

The Syrian government has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons in the war that has killed 310,000 people since March 2011.

UN-brokered talks that opened on Thursday in Geneva ran into hurdles after Russia insisted that counter-terrorism be added to the agenda -- putting pressure on opposition groups with ties to Islamist fighters.

Putin -- whose military intervention in Syria helped turn the tables in favor of Assad -- lamented that the negotiations in Switzerland are "not going as smoothly as hoped." </s> Russia on Tuesday cast its seventh veto to protect the Syrian government from United Nations Security Council action, blocking a bid by Western powers to impose sanctions over accusations of chemical weapons attacks during the six-year Syrian conflict.

China backed Russia and cast its sixth veto on Syria. Russia had said the vote on the resolution, drafted by France and Britain, would harm UN-led peace talks between the warring Syrian parties in Geneva, which began last week.

The defeated resolution would also have banned all countries from supplying Syria's government with helicopters, which investigators have determined were used in chemical attacks.
• Thousands killed in mass hangings in Syrian prison since 2011, Amnesty says

Nine council members voted in favor of the resolution. Bolivia voted against the text, while Ethiopia, Egypt and Kazakhstan abstained. A resolution needs nine votes in favour and no vetoes by the United States, France, Russia, Britain or China to be adopted.

The resolution got the minimum number of votes.

The resolution followed a joint investigation by the UN and the international chemical weapons watchdog that determined the Syrian government was behind at least three attacks involving chlorine gas and the Islamic State extremist group was responsible for at least one involving mustard gas. </s> The United Nations Security Council is expected to try again on Friday to approve a draft resolution calling for a 30-day ceasefire in Syria.

The cease-fire is meant to allow emergency aid to be delivered and medical evacuations to take place in some of the country's hardest-hit regions, such as Ghouta, the rebel-controlled eastern suburb of the capital, Damascus, which has been pounded by government warplanes for more than a week.

An attempt on Thursday to get such a resolution through the council failed when Syrian government ally Russia, refused to go along. It was not clear whether amendments put forward since then would mollify Moscow's objections.

As Reuters reports: "Russia on Thursday proposed amendments to the resolution drafted by Sweden and Kuwait, arguing that the language was unrealistic and that the 15-member Security Council could not simply impose a truce on Syria without consulting the parties."

Russia's U.N. ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said on Thursday that the proposed resolution was "simply unrealistic."

NPR's Lind Fasulo reports that most Security Council members want the truce to go into effect within 72 hours, but Russia favors language that calls on all sides to halt hostilities "as soon as possible."

To succeed, a resolution would need to garner nine votes on the council and no vetoes from the five permanent members – the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China.

The death toll in the six-day bombardment of Ghouta is estimated to be more than 400.

The Associated Press notes that "The number of casualties has overwhelmed rescuers and doctors at hospitals, many of which have also been bombed."

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least five people were killed in raids on Hammouriyeh, Zamalka, Douma and al-Marj, according to Reuters.

In a just released report from Amnesty International, the group accuses Russia of having used its Security Council veto nine times "to shield the Syrian government from the consequences of war crimes and crimes against humanity."

"Russia's routine use of its veto had become the equivalent of acquiescence in war crimes, allowing all parties in Syria's conflict to act with impunity, with civilians paying the ultimate price," Amnesty says. </s> Russia has condemned the UN and Western governments for attempting to thwart their attempts at defeating ISIS in Syria, vetoing a UN Security Council proposal to end fighting.

Russia vetoed a French-drafted resolution that would have ended air strikes against key ISIS strongholds in Aleppo.

It is the fifth time Russia has vetoed a UN resolution on Syria during the more than five-year conflict.

The previous four times Russia was backed by China, but on Saturday China abstained from the vote.

Eleven of the 15 council members voted in favour of the draft resolution.

A UN resolution needs nine votes in favour and no vetoes to be adopted. The veto powers are the US, France, Britain, Russia and China.

After Russia’s veto, the council moved to the second vote on the Russian-drafted text, but it failed to gather enough votes to pass.

“It was a day of high drama at the Security Council,” said James Bays, Al Jazeera’s diplomatic editor, reporting from the UN headquarters in New York.

“The Russian ambassador called it a ‘spectacle’. I was talking to him just moments ago as he was leaving. he said no one wins and we need to go back to diplomacy.

“But certainly some ambassadors were pointing the finger at Russia because, of course, the first resolution that was proposed by France, which suggested that all military aircraft over Aleppo should be grounde,d would have gone through if it wasn’t for the Russian veto.”

After Russia’s proposal failed to gather enough votes, Matthew Rycroft, Britain’s ambassador to the UN, asked Russia to “Stop bombing Aleppo now”.

“It [the Russian proposal] failed because it failed to demand an immediate end to the aerial bombardment of Aleppo,” he said.

“It’s a sham. Just as Russia’s hollow commitment to a political process in Syria is a sham. The indiscrimiunate bombing of civilians in Aleppo is sickening and barbaric. Please stop now.”

In response to Rycroft’s comments, Vitaly Churkin, Russia’s ambassador to the UN, said “the UK should stop supporting terrorists instead”.

“Stop supporting all the villans across the world including terrorists,” he said.

Stop interfering in the internal affairs of soverign states. Stop your colonial habits. Leave the world in peace and then maybe, things will improve in many areas and regions of the world.”

In the run-up to the votes, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany’s foreign minister, said the mounting tensions between the US and Russia had created a situation “more dangerous” than the Cold War.

John Kerry, the US secretary of state, has made clear his anger at the Syrian army’s Russian-backed assault on Aleppo, saying that its bombing of civilians could amount to a war crime.

Syria has made significant advances in its renewed two-week-old offensive in Aleppo, seizing territory to the north and pushing back the front line in the city centre.

The front line had remained largely static since the rebels captured the eastern districts in 2012.

Since the government’s offensive began on September 22, a few days after a joint US-Russia-brokered ceasefire collapsed, at least 290 people – mostly civilians – have been killed in rebel-held areas, 57 of them children, says the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) monitoring group.

And 50 civilians, including nine children, have been killed in rebel shelling on government-held areas of the city, according to the SOHR, which relies on a network of sources on the ground.

It said government forces were making further advances on Saturday in the lead-up to the Security Council session.

The SOHR reported heavy air strikes on the rebel-held Fardos and Sukari neighbourhoods.

The assault by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces has led to a global outcry after air strikes on hospitals and a UN aid convoy.

The offensive has also elicited a warning from Staffan de Mistura, the UN envoy, that eastern Aleppo could be “totally destroyed” by the year’s end.

Council members held negotiations during the past week on the French proposal for an end to the bombing of Aleppo, access for aid deliveries and a ban on military flights over the city.

Churkin said the French measure was “hastily put together” and suggested it was “not designed to make progress … but to cause a Russian veto.

“I cannot possibly see how we can let this resolution pass”. </s> The United Nations Security Council on Saturday rejected a Russian-drafted resolution urging a ceasefire in Aleppo after Moscow vetoed a rival measure calling for an end to the bombing of the Syrian city.

The measure was defeated by a vote of nine against, including Britain, France and the United States, four in favor and two abstentions in the 15-member council. </s> Russia and China have vetoed a UN Security Council proposal that would have banned the supply of helicopters to the Syrian government, and blacklisted eleven Syrian military commanders over allegations of toxic gas attacks.

The proposed resolution, put forward by Britain, France and the United States, was put to the vote of the international body on Tuesday despite an earlier pledge by Russia to use its power the quash the proposal, the seventh time it has done so since the conflict first erupted in Syria since 2011.

The nations behind the proposal criticized Russia and China for the veto.

“For my friends in Russia, this resolution is very appropriate,” said US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley after the vote. "It is a sad day on the Security Council when members start making excuses for other member states killing their own people. The world is definitely a more dangerous place."

Russia's Deputy UN Ambassador Vladimir Safronkov contended that the Western powers’ proposal was not supported by solid evidence.

"The problem is that the basis of expert work on Syria come from dubious information submitted by the armed opposition, international NGOs sympathetic to it, the media and so-called ‘Friends of Syria’,” he argued.

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“The co-sponsors [of the proposal] have chosen and odious and erroneous concept, which is totally unacceptable. The fact that the resolution wasn’t supported by six of the fifteen security council members should make the co-sponsors seriously think,” Safronkov said.

Bolivia voted against the text, while Ethiopia, Egypt and Kazakhstan abstained, according to Reuters.

Speaking from the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek earlier on Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia considers it unnecessary to impose any more penalties against the government of Bashar al-Assad.

“As for sanctions against the Syrian leadership, I think the move is totally inappropriate now,” Putin said at a news conference. “It does not help, would not help the negotiation process. It would only hurt or undermine confidence during the process.”

While the sanctions were being debated, a new round of UN-sponsored Syria peace talks between the warring sides kicked off in Geneva last week. Saying that he is not expecting a breakthrough, UN envoy Staffan de Mistura said he was nonetheless determined not to lose the momentum towards a resolution.

Although the liberation of the city of Aleppo and the loss of key territories by Islamist rebels have tipped the balance in the Syrian conflict, potential disagreements could arise over the opposition’s continued insistence that the fate of the Syrian government of President Bashar Assad be settled as a precondition – something that is not currently on the table.

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Russia announced that it has asked the Syrian government to halt all military operations for the duration of the talks, while other countries were expected to deliver the same message to the rebels.

The last round of the Geneva talks was broken off nine months ago amid a sharp escalation in hostilities.

Bashar al-Jaafari, the Syrian government’s negotiator at the Geneva talks, warned on Saturday that Damascus will view opposition groups that refuse to condemn the deadly suicides attacks in Homs as accomplices of terrorists.

At least 50 people were killed and 24 others were injured in six suicide bombings outside military facilities in the city of Homs on Saturday, SANA news agency reported, citing Syria’s Foreign Ministry.

Al-Nusra Front terrorist group, which renamed itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, has claimed responsibility for the attack.

In another comment on the attack, Ja'afari said that “the terrorist explosions that hit Homs city are a message to Geneva from sponsors of terrorism, and we tell everyone that the message is received and this crime won't pass unnoticed.”
Russia vetoes a French-drafted United Nations Security Council resolution that calls for a ceasefire in Aleppo. China, which had backed Russia's four previous Syria-related vetoes, abstains.