India Votes against UN Resolution on Climate Change

• 17 Dec 2021

Recently, India voted against a draft resolution at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) linking climate to security. The resolution was sponsored by Ireland and Nigeria.

Key Highlights

• Niger (the UNSC presidency for December) organised a debate on 9^th December, 2021, titled ‘Maintenance of international peace and security: security in the context of terrorism and climate change.’
• One of the aims of the debate was to examine how terrorism and security risks could be linked to climate change.
• The draft resolution sought to enable the United Nations Security Council to take up routine discussions on climate change from the perspective of its impact on peace and conflicts worldwide.
• While China abstained, India and Russia were the only countries that opposed the draft resolution.
• Currently, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) discusses all matters on climate change.
• India opined that it was an attempt to shift climate talks from the UNFCCC to the Security Council and a step backward for collective action on the issue. This will give a few states the free hand to decide an all climate related issues.
• It was emphasised that the draft resolution would undermine progress made at Glasgow, where the latest round of talks under the UNFCCC, the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26), concluded in November.