Two significant United Nation meetings, one in the General Assembly and another in the 15-member Security Council, will be held today, most likely to censure Russia's invasion of Ukraine amid a reflection of widespread international demands for an immediate cease-fire. The Security Council gave a green light on Sunday for the first emergency session of the General Assembly in decades. It will give all UN members an opportunity to speak about the war on Monday and vote on a resolution later in the week that U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said would "hold Russia to account for its indefensible actions and for its violations of the UN Charter."
India had earlier abstained from a procedural vote taken in the UN Security Council to call for a rare special emergency session of the UN General Assembly on Russia's aggression against Ukraine, even as New Delhi welcomed Moscow and Kyiv's decision to hold talks at the Belarus border.
The resolution was adopted with 11 votes in favour, paving the way for the General Assembly to meet on the crisis as soon as Monday. India, China and the UAE abstained, while Russia voted against the resolution. This will be only the 11th such emergency session of the General Assembly since 1950.
The 15-nation Security Council met on Sunday afternoon to hold the vote on the emergency special session of the 193-member General Assembly on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. This comes two days after the Russian veto blocked a UNSC resolution on its "aggression" against Ukraine. The vote calling for the UNGA session was procedural so none of the five permanent members of the Security Council, China, France, Russia, the UK and the US, could exercise their vetoes.
