India votes to reject Russia’s demand for secret ballot on draft resolution on Ukraine

India voted to reject Russia’s demand for a secret ballot in the UN General Assembly on a draft resolution to condemn Moscow’s “illegal” annexation of four regions of Ukraine.

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India voted to reject Russias demand for a secret ballot in the UN General Assembly on a draft resolution to condemn Moscows illegal annexation of four regions of Ukraine.

The 193-member UN General Assembly on Monday voted on a motion by Albania that action on the draft resolution that would condemn Russias illegal so-called referendums and attempted illegal annexation of the Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia regions of Ukraine be taken by a recorded vote, PTI news agency reported.

The action in the UNGA came hours after Russia carried out strikes against multiple Ukrainian cities, including Kyiv where at least 10 people were killed and around 60 others wounded across Ukraine.

Russia had demanded that the resolution be voted upon by secret ballot.

Moscows demand for a secret ballot was rejected after 107 UN member states, including India, voted in favour of a recorded vote, the news agency reported.

Meanwhile, only 13 nations voted in favour of Russias call for a secret ballot while 39 abstained. Russia and China were among the countries that did not vote.

After the motion to hold a recorded vote was adopted, Russia appealed against the ruling of the president of the general assembly.

A recorded vote on Russias appeal was held and India was among the 100 nations who voted against the challenge made by Moscow.

Russia then sought reconsideration of the decision to adopt the motion submitted by Albania for a recorded vote.

The General Assembly decided not to reconsider the motion after 104 nations, including India, voted against such a reconsideration, while 16 voted in favour and 34 abstained.

Russias Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzia said the UN membership had become witnesses to an outrageous fraud in which the president of the general assembly, unfortunately, played a key role”, PTI reported.

“We were not given the floor to make a point of order (the indicator light at our seat is still on), our statement was distorted, and now UN member states are being robbed of their right to express their opinion freely.”

This is an unprecedented manipulation undermining the authority of the general assembly and the United Nations as a whole. Of course, in such circumstances we opted to not take part in the vote, he said.

India last month had abstained while Russia vetoed a draft UN Security Council resolution tabled by the US and Albania to condemn Moscow’s illegal referenda and declared the annexation of four Ukrainian territories as invalid.

Meanwhile, India has not yet condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and maintained that the crisis must be resolved through diplomacy and dialogue.