The UN General Assembly held a plenary meeting on December 7. The resolution was submitted by Russia and initially co-authored by Brazil and China, it said.

“An overwhelming support of our document by UN member states [129 countries backed the resolution] demonstrates the exclusive importance and topicality of our initiative. Notably, the number of resolution co-authors grew to 40 states at the current session,” the ministry said.

The United States was the only country that refused to back the Russian initiative, the ministry said. Washington “has been trying to block the insistent efforts of the international community in the prevention of an arms race in outer space for many years, in practically complete isolation,” it said.

“Georgia and Ukraine sided with it lately,” the ministry added.

The approach of EU member states which used to maintain a rather constructive position on this issue is raising many questions, the ministry said.

“Regretfully, they have been abstaining in the vote on this resolution for two years in a row under U.S. pressure, which signals their indifference towards deployment of weapons in outer space,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

“This gives a reason to doubt the EU’s reliability as a partner in the dialogue on the prevention of the use of force in outer space,” it said.

Russia intends to continue its energetic work on globalization of the resolution, ‘No first Placement of Weapons in Outer Space’, the ministry said.