Lithuania, Poland, and Ukraine have won the vote to sit on the Executive Council of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), while Russia lost in its bid for re-election to the chemical watchdog’s decision-making body on Wednesday.
Four countries – Russia, Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania – were competing for three seats on the OPCW Executive Council.
Russia received least votes, meaning that it will have no seat on the council for the first time in the organisation’s history.
“OPCW is a very reputable international body and terrorists have no place in it,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky posted on X (Twitter).
Zelensky said Russia’s exclusion from the council was a “logical result” of its aggression against Ukraine.
“Its role in international affairs keeps diminishing and its isolation keeps growing,” he added.
The news was also confirmed by Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis.
“Russia has just been voted off the OPCW Executive Council,” Landsbergis posted on X. “Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania were successful.”
“It’s time for all international organisations to clean themselves up in order to maintain their relevance and credibility,” he added.
The OPCW won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2013 for its efforts to eliminate the threat posed by chemical weapons to the world.
In July, the organisation announced that all the world’s declared stockpiles of chemical weapons were “verified as irreversibly destroyed”.
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