India Votes In Favour Of Volodymyr Zelensky On Virtual Address Question

India voted in favour of allowing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to address UNSC virtually.

New York:

India was among the 13 countries who voted in favour of a proposal seeking to allow Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to address the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) virtually.

As the UNSC meeting began, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations Vassily A Nebenzia requested a procedural vote concerning the Ukrainian president’s participation in the meeting through video conference.

Russia voted against while China abstained from voting.

“The result of the voting is as follows: 13 votes in favour, one vote against, one abstention. The proposal to invite Volodymyr Zelensky, President of Ukraine to participate in today’s meeting via VTC, has been adopted,” Chinese Ambassador to the UN and UNSC President Zhang Jun said on Wednesday.

It must be noted that Russia objected to Volodymy Zelensky’s virtual participation, noting it does not oppose him addressing a UNSC meeting in person.

Earlier, India on Wednesday announced that it is ready to dispatch its 12th consignment of humanitarian aid to Ukraine consisting of twenty-six types of medicines on a special request from the Ukrainian side.

Addressing a United Nations Security Council briefing, the country’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Ruchira Kamboj said that the humanitarian aid includes ‘hemostatic bandages’ which are meant to stem the bleeding of deep wounds in children and adults and are included in the aid on the specific request by the Ukrainian side as the members meet to mark 6 months since the beginning of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.

This comes as the Ukrainian authorities by requested assistance from the Government of India to tackle the looming crisis in the country.

“We have delivered for the world in terms of vaccines. We did it earlier for medicines. So, I’d like to assure this council that India will step forward whenever the global south is constrained on aspects of food, health & energy security,” Ruchira Kamboj said.

The ambassador said that India’s approach will be to promote dialogue and diplomacy with an aim to end the conflict to mitigate the economic challenges emerging from the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine seeking an early resolution.