Eleven countries voted in favour of the resolution while three countries - India, China and the UAE abstained.
Congress leader Salman Khurshid, who is a part of India's diplomatic mission abroad, on Monday said it is 'distressing' that people back home are calculating political allegiances and asked if it is 'so difficult to be patriotic'.
Amid the spirited debate, the Third Committee of the United Nations General Assembly approved a draft resolution on combating the glorification of Nazism by a recorded vote of 105 in favour to 52 against, with 15 abstentions.
It is the first time that India has voted on a resolution at the UN that is being perceived as pro-Israel.
India and other like-minded countries in the United Nations Security Council decided to support a Western-backed draft resolution on Syria only after it was agreed to explicitly remove provisions of regime change, threat of sanctions and military intervention. The draft resolution on Syria, introduced by Morocco and supported by the Arab League, failed to be adopted by the UN Security Council as two of its permanent members, Russia and China, vetoed it.
The 193-member UN General Assembly on Thursday voted to adopt a draft resolution moved by the US to suspend Russia from the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) over allegations that Russian soldiers killed civilians while retreating from towns near the Ukrainian capital Kyiv.
The warmth and respect for India were evident wherever I went and noticed how most Latin Americans have Indian gurus either directly or online and yoga was very much in vogue, observes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
'PM Modi would have swept the elections in Kashmir after notebandi but then he scrapped Article 370 so all his good work went down the drain.'
India, along with 12 other United Nations Security Council members, abstained on a resolution by Russia on the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.
The Council will vote on the draft resolution at 3 pm Friday (New York time), two days after it held an emergency meeting on the situation in Ukraine just as Putin had announced Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.
When asked the reason for India's abstention from a resolution in the UN General Assembly on October 27, 2023, regarding the protection of civilians and upholding legal and humanitarian obligations, Jaishankar said there were many resolutions in the UN General Assembly and in some India abstained and in some, it voted in favour.
A spokesperson for United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said the world body 'hopes' that in India and any country that is having elections, people's 'political and civil rights' are 'protected' and everyone is able to vote in a 'free and fair' atmosphere.
India abstained in the United Nations General Assembly on a draft resolution introduced by Pakistan and co-sponsored by China on Islamophobia, asserting that the prevalence of 'religiophobia' against Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism and other faiths facing violence and discrimination must also be acknowledged rather than singling out just one religion.
The UN General Assembly has overwhelmingly adopted a Saudi-drafted resolution on Syria that denounced the escalating violence in the country and demanded a political transition, a voting in which India was among 31 nations that abstained.
I will tell you one thing, to be the Foreign Minister of Modi government is also a great strength, Jaishankar said.
India on Monday abstained from a procedural vote taken in the UN Security Council ahead of a meeting to discuss the situation on the Ukraine border.
The resolution recognised the contribution of sports in creating an atmosphere of tolerance and understanding among peoples and nations, its role to prevent and counter terrorism and violent extremism and its contributions to building resilience against radicalisation to violence and terrorist recruitment.
A country required two-thirds majority of 124 to win a seat in the elections.
The UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday adopted a resolution against Sri Lanka's rights record, in a setback to Colombo, which made determined efforts to garner international support ahead of the voting.
By proposing the addition of six permanent members this year, it may appear that it was a major concession, but in actual fact, it will make no difference to the privilege of the permanent five as the new six will have no veto, ever! points out Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
India on Friday won a crucial election to the UN Board of Auditors with its nominee Shashi Kant Sharma, the Comptroller and Auditor General, garnering the largest number of votes.
Lee Jae-myung's decisive victory in South Korea's snap presidential election marks a major political shift driven by public backlash against authoritarian, with significant implications for domestic reform and the future of the US-South Korea alliance, observes Dr Rajaram Panda.
The 15-member Council held a formal vote here to elect Guterres, the former UN High Commissioner for refugees had emerged as the "clear favourite" to succeed Ban Ki-moon, 72, as the 9th Secretary General.
The UN Security Council is scheduled to vote on Friday evening on a draft resolution on Russia's military operation in Ukraine as well as the escalating situation in the eastern European country.
India's vote comes a day after Trump warned countries against opposing the US position.
In its explanation of vote, India said 'we find that our views have not been reflected in the draft being considered for adoption today. We would like to reiterate that a consultative and constructive approach involving the neighbouring countries and the region, remains important as the international community strives for the peaceful resolution of the issue'.
The presidency of the Council is held by each of the members in turn for one month, following the English alphabetical order of the member states' names. According to the information released by the office of the UN spokesperson, India will assume the rotating presidency of the Council for the month of August next year.
The race for the UN secretary-general for 2022-2027 is already over and another term for Antonio Guterres is a foregone conclusion, observes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
'There are reports that the Biden administration is contemplating imposing CAATSA sanctions against India, the largest democracy on Earth'
Deposed Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has issued a strong warning against threats to ban her Awami League party, calling the demands "audacious" and accusing Nobel laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus of being a "fraud" and "corrupt" for his role in the current interim government. Hasina, who fled Bangladesh in August 2024 following a student-led uprising, claims Yunus assumed power through a "meticulous design" with funding from overseas and misled students and people. She asserts that her Awami League is the legitimate party, with a strong history of fighting for the people's rights, and accuses Yunus and his supporters of having no constitutional basis or people's mandate to rule the country.
The main Opposition BNP of former premier Khaleda Zia, 78, who is under house arrest, is boycotting the elections amidst violence.
Amidst mounting pressure from ally Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and other parties, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday said India was "inclined to" vote in favour of a resolution on Sri Lanka at the UN which meets "our objectives" with regard to the future of ethnic Tamils.
Jaishankar said he emphasised that India supports diplomacy and dialogue as the "way out".
The resolution did not include any explicit condemnation of the October 7 terrorist attacks by Hamas, they said, adding India abstained in the vote in absence of all elements of its approach not being covered in the final text of the resolution.
India's voting pattern in the United Nations with regard to the Israel-Palestine conflict is lately marked by a calibrated distancing from Israel, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The Dutch envoy said to Tirumurti "You should not have abstained in the GA. Respect the UN Charter."
The UN General Assembly has overwhelmingly approved the first ever arms treaty regulating the $70 billion global arms trade, even as India abstained saying that the draft was "weak" on terrorism and non-state actors.
India was elected to the UN Security Council as a non-permanent member with a thumping majority of votes, including that of Pakistan, in what was quickly described by New Delhi as significant.
In a significant victory, India has been re-elected to the UN's main human rights body for the period of 2015-17, receiving the highest number of votes in the Asia-Pacific group.
Many were hoping that with Vajpayee's NDA gone, there would be a return to the Congress normal. Nobody was prepared for the opposite. Sonia Gandhi was sceptical. This became the only issue over which Manmohan Singh took on his party bosses and risked his government. Politically, it was riskier than the 1991 reform, recalls Shekhar Gupta.
