Prime Minister Imran Khan blasted E.U. Ambassadors for their double standards. The heads of 22 diplomatic missions, including those of European Union member states and Japan, had publicly released a joint letter on March 1 urging Pakistan to support a resolution in the United Nations General Assembly condemning the Russian attack on Ukraine. The move to release the letter publicly was rare and a clear violation of diplomatic norms.
“What do you think of us? Are we your slaves…that whatever you say, we will do?” Imran Khan said while addressing a roaring crowd in Mailsi, South Punjab. Khan questioned if ambassadors had written a similar letter to the Indian government. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka abstained in the UNGA debate against Russia. Earlier, India, a non-permanent member of the UNSC, also abstained when the U.S. presented a resolution against Russia.
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Objecting to that press release, the Foreign Office had said: “We took note of that and in a subsequent meeting with a group of ambassadors. We expressed our concern about that because it was not the way diplomacy should be practised”. UNGA meeting was the first of its kind after almost 25 years – the last time the United Nations convened an emergency meeting was in 1997. Before the UNGA emergency session, China, India, and U.A.E. had abstained when a similarly worded resolution opposing the Russian invasion of Ukraine came up for a vote in the Security Council.