India has abstained from voting on United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution on the "protection of civilians and upholding legal and humanitarian obligations" on Gaza crisis. The resolution was adopted at the UN General Assembly.
The resolution also called for unhindered humanitarian access in the Gaza strip.
The 193 members of the UN General Assembly (UNGA), which met in a resumed 10th Emergency Special Session, voted on the draft resolution submitted by Jordan and co-sponsored by more than 40 nations including Bangladesh, Maldives, Pakistan, Russia and South Africa.
The resolution titled "Protection of civilians and upholding legal and humanitarian obligations" was overwhelmingly adopted with 120 nations voting in its favour, 14 against it and 45 abstaining.
Besides India, countries that abstained included Australia, Canada, Germany, Japan, Ukraine and the UK.
The UN Security Council has to take the General Assembly resolution in order to maximise the political pressure on Israel to stop this war and to save Palestinian civilians. We are grateful to a great majority of European countries who either voted in favour of the resolution or abstained from voting," says Riyad Mansour, Palestinian Ambassador to the UN, after the UN General Assembly approved a resolution calling for a 'humanitarian truce' in Gaza.
"India has always supported a negotiated two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine issue leading to the establishment of a sovereign, independent and viable State of Palestine living within secure and recognised borders, side-by-side in peace with Israel. For this, we urge the parties to de-escalate, eschew violence and work towards creating conditions for an early resumption of direct peace negotiations," sources said.
The resolution in the UNGA did not include any explicit condemnation of the terrorist attacks of October 7. An amendment was moved to include this aspect, prior to the vote on the main resolution. We voted in favour of the amendment and it obtained 88 votes in favour (but not the requisite two thirds majority), they said.
In the absence of the all elements of our approach not being covered in the final text of the resolution, we abstained in the vote on its adoption, the government sources mentioned.
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