Moscow Celebrations

Historical truth of Second World War critical - Russian envoy

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-05-07 15:17

UNITED NATIONS - As the international community pays tribute to the end of the Second World War, historical truth should not be cast aside, Russian Ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin told reporters on Thursday.

"We should not confuse and deceive the younger generations about what happened in World War II because that will make us morally corrupt," Churkin said during a special session of the General Assembly commemorating the Second World War. "This idea that the war was fought against totalitarianism regimes is historically false and runs contrary to our core world values."

Some 50 to 70 million people perished during the six-year war, in which the Allied forces eventually defeated the Axis, led by Adolf Hitler, in 1945. As the war drew to a close, delegations of the world gathered in San Francisco to daft the United Nations charter, which was intended to foster international cooperation and prevent future conflicts.

Churkin called World War II, "a war that determined the future of mankind."

"Had Nazis not been defeated in that war, the future of civilization would have been completely different," he said. "The entropic ideas of racism and national annihilation would have triumphed."