Bashar Ja'afari, permanent representative of Syria to the UN, said here Monday that the international community is failing to respect principles of national sovereignty, territorial integrity and non-intervention in the case of Syria, therefore helping to prolong the conflict there.

"It was as if all the charter of the United Nations was being ignored, and a new draft was being written," he said.

Ja'afari's statement came as he addressed the UN General Assembly as it met on a Human Rights Council (HRC) report on Syria.

The report condemned "continued widespread, systematic, and gross violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms" committed by Syrian authorities and invited UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to support the League of Arab States in its actions on the matter. The report passed in the HRC with 37 votes in favor, four against, and six abstentions.

The Syrian representative said that Navi Pillay, the UN high commissioner for human rights, and her office had not done sufficient investigation of human rights violations they alleged Syria had committed. He said that Pillay, who also spoke at the General Assembly meeting, based her evaluations of Syria solely on reports, not on facts on the ground.

As for the HRC, he stated, they had only used information in their report from opposition forces in Syria.

According to Ja'afari, the high commissioner had failed to investigate attacks on Syria, including sanctions imposed by other countries, and bombings of government targets in Aleppo and Damascus that resulted in deaths and injuries.

He cited reports that Al-Qaida has been responsible for suicide bombs in these two cities, and said he hoped that Pillay would acknowledge this in her next report on Syria.

In Syria, terrorist groups have gone so far as to mine buildings so they could be blown up remotely, he said.

"This is not peaceful demonstration," he said. "This is violence."

Ja'afari questioned how the UN could claim to be firmly opposed to Al-Qaida when certain states in the world organization, he alleged, are supporting the group. He said that Al-Qaida has made calls for its components to converge in Syria and that it even has declared deaths of its operatives in Syria on its website.

Ja'afari said that the Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have rejected Syria's attempts to promote democratic reform and respect for human rights, but that in spite of this, Syria will continue to stand "shoulder to shoulder" to defend other Arab states.