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Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem at the 74th UN General Assembly in New York on September 28. REUTERS / Brendan McDermid

Unsurprisingly, the Syrian Foreign Minister warned the United Nations General Assembly on Saturday that his country would no longer accept a foreign military presence in his country.

With our correspondent in New York , Carrie Nooten

Walid al-Mualem explained that for Damascus, the US and Turkish military presence in the north of the country was illegal, and the occupying forces had to leave Syria immediately. Without this, he warned in the sparse hemicycle of the General Assembly, Damascus, which has regained control of almost the entire country, has the right to retaliate.

Nothing new in the speech of the regime of Bashar al-Assad - a line repeatedly repeated at the UN through his permanent representative Syrian, supported by Russia during these eight years of civil war.

A contrast, however, with the speech held a few minutes earlier, at the same rostrum, by the representative of the Vatican. Cardinal Pietro Parolin implored the international community to " put an end to the suffering of so many people " in Syria.

Last week, Germany, Kuwait and Belgium had asked the Security Council to vote for an immediate ceasefire in the disputed province of Idleb. Russia, backed by China, vetoed it - its 13th blockade to a resolution on Syria since the beginning of the conflict.