Most countries on Earth voted at the United Nations General Assembly to support a call for a new international economic order that is based on sovereign equality and cooperation, that rejects unilateral sanctions and advocates for debt relief for the Global South.
The only countries that opposed this widely popular proposal were the West and its allies.
The United States and its proxies were also the lone votes against common-sensical resolutions promoting sustainable development, biological diversity, and basic civil rights for Palestinians. Almost the entire world supported these proposals.
Washington showed itself to be a rogue state on the international stage, voting against practically every resolution, even on uncontroversial issues where the rest of the planet is in agreement.
Most of these resolutions were commonplace, are introduced every year, and have been voted on many times before, with similar results: the West vs. the rest.
In 1974, formerly colonized nations in the Global South proposed a plan to dismantle the remaining economic structures of colonialism.
They called it the New International Economic Order (NIEO), and said that it should be “based on the principles of equity, sovereign equality, interdependence, common interest, cooperation and solidarity among all States.”
The NIEO has been consistently voted on at the United Nations in the five decades since. And the West has persistently opposed it.
On December 14, 2022, 123 countries voted in favor of the NIEO – 64% of the UN’s 193 member states. (The number would have been even higher, but several nations that have been illegally sanctioned by the US, such as Venezuela and Zimbabwe, had their UN voting rights temporarily suspended because they have been unable to pay their membership fees in dollars.)
Just 50 nations voted against it, with one abstention, from NATO member Türkiye.
The 50 countries opposed to the call for a fairer, more equitable economic system consisted of the United States, members of the European Union, Britain, Israel, Canada, Australia, South Korea, and Japan.
This grouping has been referred to as the “Collective West.”
The West is not a geographic construct; it is a political one. This is why Australia, which was created as a British settler colony, is located in the eastern hemisphere but is politically and culturally part of the West.
The same is true for apartheid Israel, which like Australia was created as a British settler-colonial project and has since become a US proxy with a key geostrategic location in West Asia.
Similarly, the two East Asian nations that are part of this Western bloc are military occupied by the United States, which has stationed tens of thousands of troops in Japan since the mid-1940s and in South Korea since the early 1950s.
Reflecting on the December 14 vote, Chinese journalist Chen Weihua observed, “It’s US and EU against the rest of the world. Basically 900 million against the more than 7 billion from Asia, Africa to Latin America.”
It’s US and EU against the rest of the world. Basically 900 million against the more than 7 billion from Asia, Africa to Latin America.
— Chen Weihua （陈卫华） (@chenweihua) December 15, 2022
The UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolution “reaffirms the need to continue working towards a new international economic order based on the principles of equity, sovereign equality, interdependence, common interest, cooperation and solidarity among all States.”
It also “reiterates that States are strongly urged to refrain from promulgating and applying any unilateral economic, financial or trade measures not in accordance with international law and the Charter of the United Nations that impede the full achievement of economic and social development, particularly in developing countries.”
The resolution calls for “mutually supporting world trade, monetary and financial systems” and “coordination of macroeconomic policies among countries to avoid negative spillover effects, especially in developing countries”
It similarly urges debt relief for the Global South, stating that it “expresses concern over the increasing debt vulnerabilities of developing countries, the net negative capital flows from developing countries, the fluctuation of exchange rates and the tightening of global financial conditions, and in this regard stresses the need to explore the means and instruments needed to achieve debt sustainability and the measures necessary to reduce the indebtedness of developing countries.”
The December 14 vote took place in the 53rd plenary meeting of the 77th session of the UNGA, featuring reports from the body’s Second Committee, which focuses on economic and financial affairs.
Rogue state: USA votes against entire world at UN
The votes were very similar on related UNGA resolutions. They illustrated how the United States and its proxies act as rogue regimes, violating the will of the international community.
A proposal on “international trade and development” had almost the exact same vote, with 122 in favor, 48 against, and one abstention (once again, Türkiye).
In this resolution, “the Assembly urged the international community to adopt urgent and effective measures to eliminate the use of unilateral economic, financial or trade measures that are not authorized by relevant organs of the United Nations, and that are inconsistent with the principles of international law or the Charter of the United Nations or that contravene the basic principles of the multilateral trading system and that affect, in particular, but not exclusively, developing countries.”
A related resolution emphasized the “role of the United Nations in promoting development in the context of globalization and interdependence.”
In this vote, European countries abstained. The only votes against the resolution came from the United States and Israel.
In the measure, “the Assembly noted with concern that the mobilization of sufficient financing remains a major challenge in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and that progress has not been shared evenly within and among countries, leading to further deepening of existing inequalities.”
Even on other resolutions that were completely straightforward and common-sensical, the US voted against the entire world.
The UNGA adopted a resolution calling to implement the Convention on Biological Diversity and reaffirming its contribution to sustainable development.
166 countries supported the resolution, while just three nations opposed it (the US, Israel, and Japan), with one abstention (South Korea).
All 193 UN member states except for one, the USA, have ratified the Convention on Biological Diversity. Washington stands alone as the only capital on Earth that refuses to join the planet-saving agreement.
The United States also opposed most of the world in a UN vote to recognized the “permanent sovereignty of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and of the Arab population in the occupied Syrian Golan over their natural resources.”
This resolution passed with 159 countries in favor and 10 abstentions (Australia, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Guatemala, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Solomon Islands, South Sudan, Togo, and Tuvalu).
A mere eight member states voted against recognizing these basic political and civil rights for Palestinians, including the US, Israel, Canada, Chad, and small island nations that typically vote as US proxies at the UN, including the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and Palau (all former US colonies that have “free association” agreements with Washington and use the dollar as their currency), and Nauru (which uses the Australian dollar).
This pattern was yet again visible in a resolution titled “Oil Slick on Lebanese Shores,” in which the UN lightly criticized Israel for illegally bombing Lebanon’s Jiyeh Power Station in 2006, unleashing a massive oil spill that still causes problems today.
In addition to severely damaging the environment, the UN noted that this Israeli attack cost Lebanon at least $856.4 million.
The language of the resolution was very mild, expressing “its deep concern about the adverse implications of the destruction by the Israeli Air Force of the oil storage tanks in the direct vicinity of the Lebanese Jiyeh electric power plant for the achievement of sustainable development in Lebanon.”
160 member states voted in favor of the resolution, including European countries.
It was opposed only by the US, Israel, Canada, Australia, and Washington’s proxies in the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, and Palau.
These votes on December 14 were by no means the only time the United States has exposed to the world its status as an unaccountable rogue regime.
For the 30th year in a row, almost every country on Earth voted at the UN to condemn the illegal, 60-year US blockade of Cuba
185 to 2
USA and apartheid Israel voted against
2 abstained: Bolsonaro's far-right Brazil and NATO's client regime in Ukrainehttps://t.co/g7KFeiYeGP
— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) November 3, 2022
In recent UN votes condemning the six-decade US blockade on Cuba and calling on Israel to get rid of its nuclear weapons, Washington and Tel Aviv spat in the face of the rest of the world.
The United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly, 152 to 5, to tell the Israeli apartheid regime to get rid of its nuclear weapons, which are illegal under international law https://t.co/YCQsbXWFZp
— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) November 1, 2022
joe bongiovanni
2022-12-26 at 12:27
It remains a laudable effort for The Restofus people that the Nations of the world persist in their actions to achieve the equity, sovereignty and other societal manners seemingly available to both advanced civilizations and modern monetary economies.
However, undoubtedly greater effort MUST yet be made to grasp the need for yet further re-alignment among our global institutions, systems and structures. That would be an internal re-alignment between the goals of substantive political-economic reform, and the means being provided in the proposal that is advanced and decided-upon on a regular basis.
May I be candid(?) – though it may seem merely glib to some invested in this global notion respecting equity and sovereignty. Here’s the thing.
ANYONE who supports the current central-banking monetary regimes, as the proposal overtly and affirmatively provides, where ALL of the world’s money must be first created by private banks from nothing into a newly-existing debt that is much greater than the money EVER created to pay that debt – is in need of a monetary-economy tune-up. What was it Lincoln said about issuing the nation’s Greenbacks being “the supreme prerogative of government’ ?
With regard to the central bankers’ unique trick that usurps the sovereign’s power of money-issuance and its ability to deliver the preferred social equity “within” national economies, Dr. Frederick Soddy observed in his 1934 (?) book : The Role of Money, the following:
“”To allow it to become a source of revenue to private issuers is to create, first, a secret and illicit arm of the government and, last, a rival power strong enough ultimately to overthrow all other forms of government.”” (*)
*You are here. We are all here together ……. and THAT is the problem.
All nation’s supporting the equity and sovereignty ‘gains’ that can emanate from true public money administration in public service NEED to begin the friendly separation from the private banker’s ‘credit-money’ system.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/house-bill/2990/text
With their own pen. In their own language.
The struggle to achieve properly managed ‘Sovereignty’ over our money, coupled with the priority and proper use of that money power, is what bore this country through its very painful birth. Which was won !
Let’s not let their blood be shed in vain.
All the world’s people want their money back.
Thanks.
The Money Apprentice
SEAN MCMAHON
2022-12-30 at 18:24
Thanks for this great analysis.
Felipe
2023-01-02 at 09:00
Ben, use the https://mastodon.social/@bennorton