EDITORIAL: The UN General Assembly (UNGA) on Wednesday adopted a resolution on “Universal Realization of the Right of Peoples to Self-Determination” sponsored by Pakistan and backed by 71 countries. Declaring that self-determination is a fundamental condition for the guarantee and observance of human rights, it calls on “those states responsible to cease immediately their military intervention in and occupation of foreign countries and territories.” Acknowledging thereby the right of all peoples to struggle against foreign occupation by all means available, the resolution gives traction to Pakistan’s legal and moral case on Kashmir. The UNGA passed another resolution entitled “the Right of the Palestinian People to Self-determination” by a record 168 votes in favour to five against with 10 abstentions. No prizes for guessing right the negative vote. As usual, the naysayers were the US, the real culprit Israel, and three other countries that get some attention only when they vote against the Palestinians: Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, and Nauru.
The resolutions reflect the will of the majority of the UN member states. Yet moral principles carry little weight when it comes to interests of the veto-wielding members of the UN Security Council (UNSC) who as victors of the Second World War arrogated to themselves the power to decide the fate of smaller nations. The UNSC has passed as many as 17 resolutions on the Kashmir issue recognizing the Kashmiri people’s right to self-determination through a UN-supervised plebiscite, and suggesting some practical measures as well to that end. Sadly, the world body has failed to implement these resolutions. And adding insult to injury certain countries, especially the US, have even been advocating inclusion of India in the elite club of UNSC’s permanent members, despite its repudiation of that very body’s decisions. Some of its supporters try to make light of India’s transgressions arguing that none of the resolutions pertaining to Kashmir makes a specific reference to UN Charter’s chapter VI or VII that make the UNSC’s decisions binding, authorizing use of force or sanctions to ensure implementation. But then there is the case of the November 1967 Resolution-242 unanimously adopted by the UNSC under Chapter VII in the aftermath of the Six Day Arab-Israeli war. It calls for withdrawal of Israel from territories occupied in the conflict, and respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity of every state in the area. More than half a century later Israel remains in occupation of Palestinian lands and Syria’s Golan Heights, encouraged and supported by the US using its veto power in favor of occupation and oppression.
The UN Charter emphasizes the principle of sovereign equality of all member states. But its power structure contradicts that principle, as the above details exemplify. That needs to change embodying the democratic values otherwise fervently championed by the so-called leader of the ‘free world’, the US, which has no qualms about riding roughshod over the rights and security of smaller nations. There is an urgent need for change in the permanent membership of the UNSC in a way that accords equal weight to votes of all nations represented in the UNGA.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2020
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