UNITED NATIONS: Russia has backed India's candidature for a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council, saying that any reform of the UN body cannot involve additional seats being allocated to Western countries, especially Germany and Japan.

“Our principled approach is the following: UN Security Council reform cannot involve any additional seats being allocated to Western countries, especially to Germany and Japan, who are now on the path to militarism and revanchism,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in his address to the UN General Assembly.

“We are in favour of broadening the representation of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. We support Brazil's and India's candidatures for a permanent seat, and at the same time, I wish to emphasise this: we must satisfy the interests of the African continent,” he said.

Lavrov added that through its foreign policy, "Russia is trying to fix the situation in the world, working together with its allies and strategic partners: the BRICS, the SCO, and the Eurasian Economic Union".

“We are promoting an agenda which we can all get behind- a unifying agenda, concrete ideas and projects. Today, what's coming to the fore is the topic of international information security. Clearly, the UN should play a central role in these discussions, not other narrow fora,” he said.