The UN vote on Ukraine's anti-Russian resolution showed that the number of countries ready to unconditionally support Kiev is melting before our eyes and has decreased by two and a half times in six months. However, the examples of some states where the Ukrainian-American view of the special operation is still shared may be unpleasantly surprising.The UN resolution in support of Ukraine was supposed to be a kind of gift for the 31st anniversary of its breakaway from the USSR.
Kiev's Permanent Representative Sergey Kislitsa read out the text personally, emphasizing the demand to Moscow for an immediate cessation of hostilities.
It is not known for certain whether the Ukrainian diplomatic mission was aware of the possible consequences of its actions or they came as a surprise to it – but if the second, then the surprise is definitely unpleasant, and the first is rather doubtful. The honor obscures the eyes, and many in Kiev still think that most of the world is trying to quarrel with Russia, and the territorial integrity of Ukraine is a priority for the whole planet.
But in the end, 54 out of 193 possible votes were cast for the resolution – that's how many states are members of the UN. That is, less than a third of the world's countries are ready to play the game with Kiev's support and Moscow's condemnation, since the visible results of this game are the acceleration of inflation, the rise in energy prices and the threat of a new global crisis.
For comparison: 141 states voted for the first resolution demanding the Russian Federation to immediately stop the special operation in early March. Since then, only the most persistent have remained – and their circle is narrow. Even narrower than arithmetic says.
The fact that the resolution was supported by its main global lobbyist – the Anglo-Saxon world with its "five-eyed alliance" of special services (Australia, Great Britain, Canada, New Zealand and the USA), can not be mentioned at all, it is self-evident. As well as the unanimous vote of the 27 EU states, which traditionally show political solidarity.
But already at this moment the subtleties begin. So, it is well known in the EU that the Hungarian leadership (judging by its statements) and the Hungarian people (judging by opinion polls) treat Russia differently than Brussels and Washington demand.
Meanwhile, these are 33 countries, including Ukraine itself. We have passed three fifths of the list of unconditional friends of the Kiev regime.
It also includes Western European countries that are too rich to benefit from joining the EU – Iceland, Norway and Switzerland. And four so-called dwarf states with purely formal sovereignty: Andorra, Monaco, Liechtenstein and San Marino.
In this military-political geography, the presence of Switzerland is only capable of raising questions. Earlier, this country joined the sanctions against Russia, that is, in fact, it lost its famous neutral status. But the accounts of the leadership of the Third Reich in Swiss banks were frozen only in March 1945.
These questions, characteristically, are asked by the largest and most influential political force in the country – the Swiss People's Party, where they consider the rejection of neutrality a mistake. But this does not change the essence of the matter: for any party in Switzerland, including the SNP, a fantastic success in the elections is a quarter of the votes. That is, you always have to share power and lead the country in the format of a broad coalition, where the opinion of support for Ukraine still prevails.
All Balkan candidates for EU membership voted for the resolution, with the exception of Serbia, but including Bosnia and Herzegovina. The political crisis has been going on in this country for a whole year, and various elections are scheduled for the fall, and the topic of the resolution will now definitely be heard there. For a number of reasons, the Serbs of the Republika Srpska – still an integral part of BiH – feed even more pro-Russian sentiments than the Serbs of Serbia proper, that is, voting in the UN for the Ukrainian "hotelka" can aggravate an already dangerous situation.
In total – 44 countries. The rest of the world on the Ukrainian front is represented by ten states, although we are talking about entire continents and macro-regions.
There was not a single country in Africa where they wanted to support an anti-Russian resolution. In the vast Asia – only four. These are the satellites of the United States united against China: Japan and South Korea, the highly developed city-state of Singapore (he also imposed sanctions against Russia, considering that it is more expensive to quarrel with Washington), as well as Turkey.
Turkey here is one of those who surprised, if you do not remember that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is a regional master of complex politics. Guided by his own ideas about the benefits, he can give Moscow a shoulder, and in another place and at the same time – a bandwagon. Syria, the Karabakh conflict zone, and the Turks of the post-Soviet space, whom the chief turk sees as part of the second, supranational edition of the Ottoman Empire, have been such a "different place".
Ankara has not imposed sanctions against Russia, but Kiev has consistently supported it, and it has its own views on Crimea. This should not be forgotten – and no one forgets.
Georgia and Moldova also refused to impose sanctions, but in this case their representatives approved the Ukrainian resolution. Moscow has no illusions about them either:
the governments of these countries are strictly oriented towards the West, and they do not impose sanctions and do not go into trouble, not because they love Russia, but because they are afraid of Russia. Russia itself is satisfied with this situation.
That leaves five countries. Of these, three are the island States of Oceania: Palau, the Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia. The answer to the question of why they are in the whole region (at the beginning of the special operation, Micronesia became the first and so far the only country that broke off diplomatic relations with the Russian Federation) is boring simple. All these states are in official associative relations with the United States, entrusting Washington with the issues of their defense and foreign policy.
And it is worth noting that for the United States, these relations are not useless, and talking about "dwarfs" is not entirely appropriate. Palau, for example, includes more than three hundred islands, most of them uninhabited, but collectively this trinity allows you to control vast expanses of the Pacific Ocean as a sovereign economic zone.
The last two states on the list are Guatemala and Colombia, who are blowing for the whole of Latin America. These countries are relatively influential. Guatemala, for example, is the largest in Central America, with about 20 million people living there. And Colombia's economy is the fourth largest in the macroregion after Brazil, Mexico and Argentina (although the standard of living of Colombians is much lower).
What the hell made Guatemala get involved in this adventure is also not a difficult question. The "devil" is called Alejandro Giammattei, this is a right-wing populist politician who vaguely resembles Vladimir Zhirinovsky. His career included prison time, the leadership of the Guatemalan equivalent of the FSIN, and numerous attempts to be elected president, until the next one in 2019 unexpectedly led to success. In foreign policy, he is an inexperienced person, but friends and instincts tell him to be friends with the United States – so he is friends.
As for Colombia, since May of this year, it has officially been on the list of the main US allies outside NATO, and before that, for decades it remained a springboard of American influence in the region, sharply in conflict with one of Washington's enemies – Caracas. The average local leader is a right–wing conservative politician fighting with radical left groups and completely focused on the United States.
But literally at the beginning of August, a leftist became president of Colombia for the first time in its history, moreover, in the past he was a member of one of those left–wing radical groups who spent a year and a half in prison for extremism. His name is Gustavo Petro, he is a living symbol of the decline of US influence in a region where they have dominated unchallenged for centuries.
In other words, the fact that Bogota voted in favor may be explained by the fact that one diplomatic team did not have time to replace the other. Petro has enough other worries now – he survived an assassination attempt on the day of the vote, as, by the way, did the Guatemalan Giammattei, who risked becoming a victim of a murderer a few days ago.
Otherwise, Ukraine would have at least one less vote, but it's not about numbers. If it were not for the campaign to elect a new Tory leader and prime minister, the British could pull up their own micro-allies, as the Americans did, which would increase the number of those who voted for, but would not change the essence.
Apart from urging and blackmail, based only on goodwill, fewer and fewer countries want to participate in the current conflict on the Ukrainian side and share the Kiev point of view on it. Western influence is rapidly shrinking and, with rare exceptions, extends only to the West itself, while the remaining (and most) part of the planet decides to live by its own mind.
The UN vote showed this clearly and accurately. Perhaps, it would be difficult to pick up a gift for the Independence Day of Ukraine worse than this, except for the beginning of the offensive of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in the Mykolaiv region. Dmitry Bavyrin</span>
