By Dr Lubinda Haabazoka
Members of the United Nations General Assembly will today vote on a British sponsored draft resolution on whether to expel Russia from the UN Human Rights Council, this must be supported.
The issue of isolating Russia is not an African thing. It’s an issue between NATO and Russia and as such, we as a country should not be involved. Today’s vote should be a neutral one.
Zambia has over a thousand students studying in Russia on Russian tax payers money. So if we remove them from the human rights body which human rights will our students follow?
There are a lot of family ties between Zambians and people from NATO countries. Those ties also exist with Russia. So in order not to antagonise both sides, it’s advised that Zambia doesn’t even attend the vote!
We have always been non aligned because the big boys fight for issues that do not even concern us!
Russia has created a list of enemy countries and as such today’s vote has the potential to add countries into that list. We don’t want to start looking for rubbles for what we owe Russia. When we abstain, we shall be neither be here nor there!
I call upon our government to abstain for the sake of its citizens.
Thanks