UNGA: After the discovery of mass graves and human rights violations in the Ukrainian city of Bucha, a resolution supported by the United States, the United Kingdom, and other nations seeks to suspend Russia’s participation in the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), where it is an elected member.
India has voted no on at least ten UN Security Council, UN General Assembly, Human Rights Council, and International Atomic Energy Agency resolutions criticizing Russia (IAEA).
The United Nations General Assembly is set to vote on a resolution asking for Russia’s suspension from the Human Rights Council on Thursday, after which members will deliver statements on the situation in Ukraine. The vote comes as a slew of foreign officials and ministers from nations under the US-led sanctions regime visited Delhi in the last two weeks, urging India to modify its stance on Ukraine. Last week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov paid a visit to Delhi, praising India’s “independence.”
UNGA meet
When asked about India’s vote on the UNGA resolution, officials said that while India had called for an “independent inquiry” into the Bucha killings, an investigation team had not yet been formed, making voting more difficult until a definitive conclusion about who was responsible for the excesses was reached. According to an official, the vote is about the principle of whether such a method should be used to suspend an elected member of the UN body, not simply Russia and Ukraine.
In what was regarded as a toughening of its attitude, India condemned the killings of civilians in Bucha on Tuesday and asked for an impartial investigation, though its speech before the United Nations Security Council didn’t specifically mention Russia. As a result, the vote, which will be the first since Libya was suspended by a unanimous UNGA decision in 2011, will be closely watched to see if India will depart from its prior abstentions. If India votes no, the vote would go in favor of the US-led resolution, which requires a two-thirds majority of the UNGA’s “present and voting” members to pass on Thursday.