The United Nations (UN) general assembly, on Thursday,
adopted a resolution calling for the suspension of Russia from the human rights
council.
The resolution received a two-thirds majority in the
193-member assembly, with 93 nations voting in favour and 24 against, while 58
countries abstained from the process.
According to a statement from the UN, the meeting marked the
resumption of a special emergency session on the war in Ukraine and followed
reports of violations committed by Russian forces.
Last weekend, viral videos from Bucha, a suburb of the
capital, Kyiv, showed the streets littered with corpses, with some having their
hands tied behind their backs.
The bodies were found after Russian troops withdrew from the
town.
The killings drew international outrage, with Western leaders
calling for war crimes investigations against Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had also called for
more sanctions on Russia.
But Russia has denied that its forces were responsible for
the civilians’ deaths, describing the video footage as “fake”.
Prior to the vote on Thursday, Sergiy Kyslytsya, Ukrainian
ambassador, urged countries to support the resolution.
“Bucha and dozens of other Ukrainian cities and villages,
where thousands of peaceful residents have been killed, tortured, raped,
abducted, and robbed by the Russian army, serve as an example of how
dramatically far the Russian Federation has gone from its initial declarations
in the human rights domain,” he had said.
“That is why this case is unique and today’s response is
obvious and self-explanatory.”
But Gennady Kuzmin, deputy Russian ambassador, called for
countries to “vote against the attempt by western countries and their allies to
destroy the existing human rights architecture”.
On Wednesday, the United States said it would impose a fresh
round of sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.
The new sanctions include a ban on all new investments in
Russia, increased sanctions on two major financial institutions in Russia —
Sberbank and Alfa-Bank — as well as on major Russian state-owned enterprises,
and sanctions on Russian government officials and their family members — including
Putin’s adult children.
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