Alone at the UN

You might have thought that the low point of America’s subservience to Russia had been reached two months ago, when it voted at the United Nations against a General Assembly resolution condemning the invasion of Ukraine. But you’d be wrong. There was further humiliation in store; to quote again Churchill’s words, it was only “the first foretaste of a bitter cup which will be proffered to us.”

Last week there was another vote: not, ostensibly, about Ukraine at all, but a routine vote on a resolution consisting mostly of typical UN boilerplate about co-operation with the Council of Europe. But because Russia was expelled from the Council of Europe following the invasion in 2022, the preamble to the resolution includes a paragraph referring to that and noting the need “to promptly restore and maintain peace and security based on respect of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of any State.”

That was enough for Russia to oppose the resolution. And these days, where Russia goes the United States follows. But it followed entirely alone. None of its usual friends or allies joined it in voting “No”. Only seven other counties dissented, all of them dictatorships and all Russian allies: Belarus, Eritrea, Mali, Nicaragua, Niger, North Korea and Sudan.

The vote in February was 93 to 18; this time it was 105 to nine. In February, the US brought with it Haiti, Hungary, Israel, the Marshall Islands and Palau, but none of those could bear to join in the disgrace this time. Palau abstained and Israel absented itself; the other three voted in favor. “Too Putinist for Viktor Orbán” is a label that will not easily wash off.

Twenty-six countries that abstained or failed to vote on the February resolution voted “Yes” last week, including many of America’s usual friends such as Colombia, Costa Rica, Ghana, Micronesia, Morocco and Panama.* And of course the vast majority of developed democracies have been in the “Yes” camp all along – in fact by my count, 95 of the UN members have voted the same way every time the Ukraine issue has come up (or 102 if you don’t distinguish between abstention and absence).

It’s not that unusual for the US to be in a small minority at the General Assembly; it happens from time to time in relation to Israel. But I’m not aware of any occasion where it’s been so totally deserted by its allies, voting without the support of a single democracy or semi-democracy.

If you’ve got the stomach for it, you can read the justification from Donald Trump’s UN ambassador. He maintains that language condemning the Russian invasion is “unhelpful in advancing the cause of peace,” and a distraction from the struggle against the “phenomenon of mass migration – arguably the defining challenge of this century.” Not to mention the need to protect Trump himself from “the aggressive and corrupt ‘lawfare’ waged against” him.

Thus far has America’s star fallen. How much lower can it go?

.

* Some of Russia’s usual allies were on that list as well, including Armenia, Georgia and Vietnam. Another 16 countries switched the other way, the most significant being Egypt, Nigeria and Serbia.