US considers its own power more important than international law, UN chief says

The US is acting with impunity and believes its power matters more than international law, UN Secretary General António Guterres has told the BBC.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today program, Guterres said Washington’s “clear conviction” was that multilateral solutions were irrelevant.

What mattered, he continued, was the “exercise of the power and influence of the United States and sometimes in this respect by the norms of international law”.

Guterres said he believed the founding principles of the UN – including the equality of member states – were now under threat.

His comments come weeks after the US struck Venezuela and seized its president – and in the context of Donald Trump’s repeated threats to annex Greenland.