– becomes 1 of 128 UN Member States to support resolution rejecting policy
By Jarryl Bryan
In a decisive response to the United States’ decision to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Guyana has voted in favour of a resolution proposed at the 72nd United Nations General Assembly meeting to oppose this move, despite the US Government’s threat to cut aid to countries against it.
Guyana was among six Caribbean Community (Caricom) nations who voted for the UN resolution during an emergency special session. The other five were Barbados, Cuba, Grenada, Dominica, and St Vincent and the Grenadines.
There were other Caribbean countries that abstained from the vote. These were
A picture from inside the UN meeting, showing the vote tally (Picture credit: United Nations News Centre)
Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago. St Kitts and Nevis, and St Lucia were absent.
A total of 128 UN Member States voted in favour of the resolution, while just nine voted against and 35 abstained.
In a statement prior to the vote, US President Donald Trump had warned that countries benefiting from US aid who vote in favour of the resolution could be cut off. It is a tone that was echoed by his representative to the UN, Nikki Haley.
“All of these nations that take our money and then they vote against us at the Security Council or they vote against us, potentially, at the Assembly, they take hundreds of millions of dollars and even billions of dollars and then they vote against us,” Trump had said. “Well, we’re watching those votes. Let them vote against us; we’ll save a lot. We don’t care.”
Israel seized the largely-Arab eastern sector of Jerusalem during the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed it, claiming both sides of the city as its “eternal and undivided capital”.
But the Palestinians want the eastern sector as the capital of their future state and fiercely oppose any Israeli attempt to extend sovereignty there. Several UN resolutions call on Israel to withdraw from territory seized in 1967 and the draft resolution contains the same language as past motions adopted by the Assembly.
Early in December of this year, Trump had declared that the US would recognise Jerusalem and that an embassy would be built there.
The resolution declares that “all States comply with Security Council resolutions regarding the Holy City of Jerusalem, and not recognise any actions or measures contrary to those resolutions”.
In the resolution, the General Assembly further affirmed that “any decisions and actions which purport to have altered the character, status or demographic composition of the Holy City of Jerusalem have no legal effect, are null and void and must be rescinded in compliance with relevant resolutions of the Security Council”.
In that regard, it also called upon all States to refrain from the establishment of diplomatic missions in the “Holy City of Jerusalem, pursuant to Security Council resolution 478 adopted in 1980”.
Reiterating its call for the reversal of the negative trends that endanger the two-State solution, the Assembly urged greater international and regional efforts and support aimed at achieving, without delay, a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East.
Washington is a longtime ally of Guyana, with US Ambassador Perry Holloway and his predecessor, Charge d’Affaires Bryan Hunt, prominent commenters on national issues. Up to press time, it was unclear exactly who made up Guyana’s team at the General Assembly meeting.
