China and Russia Veto U.N. Resolution Against Syria’s Assad

Araud added that he thinks China and Russia are now “complicit” in the atrocities being committed by Assad’s soldiers.

"Today the Security Council has failed to live up to its responsibility," German Ambassador Peter Wittig said.

"The people in Syria have been let down again."

Mohammed Loulichki, Morocco's ambassador to the UN and the only Arab member of the current council, expressed his "great regret and disappointment" that Moscow and Beijing rejected the resolution.

Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador, said she was "disgusted" by the vetoes.

France’s foreign minister, Alain Juppe, vigorously supports the resolution against Assad, citing that the hardening violence in Syria "underlines the urgency that the U.N. Security Council must break its silence to denounce the authors of this crime. The international community must recognize and support the right of the Syrian people to freedom, to security and to the choice of its political future. Those who block the adoption of such a resolution are taking a grave historical responsibility."

Prior to the vote, U.S. President Barack Obama expressed his strong support of the resolution

"The international community must work to protect the Syrian people from this abhorrent brutality," Obama said in a statement.

"The Syrian regime's policy of maintaining power by terrorizing its people only indicates its inherent weakness and inevitable collapse. Assad has no right to lead Syria, and has lost all legitimacy with his people and the international community."