THE Philippines has voted in favor of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly resolution suspending Russia from the Human Rights Council over allegations of war crimes committed by Russian soldiers in Ukraine in Eastern Europe.
Ninety-three member nations, including the Philippines, have voted in favor of the United States-led resolution. Russia’s ally China and 23 other nations have voted against it while 58 have abstained.
Russia is not yet permanently booted out of the UNHRC as formal investigations on its soldiers’ atrocities in Ukraine have yet to be concluded.
Any human being who does not have a callous heart would agree that killing defenseless civilians in a war is a monstrous act. And there is evidence of civilian deaths in Bucha, a city in Kyiv Oblast. The Associated Press journalists have reported horrific images from the city: “One blackened body had arms raised in supplication, the face contorted in a horrible scream. The skull of another had a bullet hole in the left temple. The small blackened foot of a child could be seen in the tangle of charred bodies piled together.” This excerpt of an AP report portrays the wartime barbaric acts. The world must cry for the innocents whose lives have been snuffed out by a senseless war, which has been ongoing for over a month now.
Russian state media have labeled reports of civilian deaths in Bucha as fake news. What can one expect from state media from the Eurasian country, which has been ruled by an autocrat for decades? The country’s state media has been a propaganda machine of the Kremlin for quite a long time now.
The Philippines did the right move again at the UN General Assembly. Last March, the country was among the 141 nations that voted in favor of the UNGA resolution condemning Russia for invading its neighbor and demanding it withdraw its forces. Russia has disregarded it.
The recent Philippine vote contradicted the neutral stance of President Rodrigo Duterte, who should be siding with a relatively weak nation that is currently under siege by its powerful neighbor for unfounded reasons.