India on Wednesday (local time) abstained from voting on a resolution tabled by Russia at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). India joined the western countries with this stance. Of the 15 members of the UNSC, 13 countries abstained from voting on the resolution. Only Russia and China voted in favour of it. The resolution drafted by Russia was regarding the humanitarian situation in Ukraine.
As a result of failing to get 11 votes in favour, the resolution fell through at the UNSC, reported CNN. Speaking ahead of the vote, US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said that Russia was once again trying to use the UNSC to “provide cover for its brutal actions.” She lammed Russia for putting forward a resolution to solve the problem of its own creation. Linda Thomas-Greenfield stated, “It really is unconscionable that Russia would have the audacity to put forward a resolution asking the international community to solve a human crisis that Russia alone created.”
“Russia does not care about the deteriorating humanitarian conditions or the millions of lives and dreams the war has shattered. If they cared, they would stop fighting,” she said, adding that Russia’s resolution “makes no mention of its role as the sole cause of this crisis. And our vote [of abstention] will show that we will play no part in that.” However, the Russian Ambassador to the UN Vassily Nebenzia, who also spoke ahead of the vote, claimed that their draft resolution was “analogous to other draft humanitarian resolutions.”
