At a recent ILO meeting, a new Russia-China-US bloc has emerged, seeking to edit a European-backed text on Ukraine. But Washington is not being supported in that alliance by representatives of US workers and employers.<\/p>\n
On 1 April, a United States government representative voted alongside his Russian counterpart on amendments proposed by Moscow to an International Labour Organization (ILO) resolution. The term \u201caggression,\u201d used to describe Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, was struck out and replaced with \u201csituation\u201d in Ukraine. Moscow, which had been called an aggressor in the resolution\u2019s original version, was recast as a \u201cparty to the conflict.\u201d Washington endorsed all Russian moves to rewrite the narrative and redefine the nature of the war.<\/p>\n
Since being adopted in March 2022 following Russia\u2019s attack on its neighbour, the resolution has been renewed twice a year at sessions of the ILO Governing Body in Geneva, each time by a large majority. Following Donald Trump\u2019s return to office, Washington first distanced itself from the position held by the European countries \u2013 the main backers of the text \u2013 before voting in favour of Russian amendments for the first time last autumn. This spring, the US reaffirmed its alignment with Moscow, becoming one of four countries, along with China and Niger, out of 56 voting countries to do so.<\/p>\n
Silence from Washington<\/p>\n
When asked to explain the vote, the US mission to the United Nations in Geneva referred inquiries to the State Department\u2019s communications services in Washington, which did not respond to Le Temps. Speaking privately, US representatives defend this new position \u201cin the name of peace\u201d and to \u201cavoid politicising the issue.\u201d<\/p>\n
In practice, however, Washington is playing into Moscow\u2019s hands. It also reflects a new configuration in which Russia, China and the United States form a tactical alignment against Ukrainian and European interests. After withdrawing from the Human Rights Council and the WHO, Washington is further weakening the former western alliance\u2019s position. Ukrainian authorities did not comment on the US vote. The ILO said the minutes of the latest Governing Body session will be posted online \u201cwithin roughly two weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n
The \u201cResolution concerning the aggression committed by the Russian Federation against Ukraine from the perspective of the ILO\u2019s mandate\u201d was first adopted a month after the outbreak of the war, with the support of the Biden administration and a large majority of governments (28 full members), as well as employer (14) and worker (14) representatives. The text urges Russia to immediately cease its aggression, withdraw from occupied territories and provide assistance to Ukraine. Blaise Matthey, spokesperson for the ILO employer group and vice-president for Europe and Central Asia, confirmed that the group rejected the Russian amendments, as did the worker group. Following this renewed rejection, the resolution was extended without a vote.<\/p>\n
A US divide<\/p>\n
\u201cThe only country to have changed its position is the United States,\u201d noted Swiss trade unionist and ILO expert Luca Cirigliano. \u201cDespite the current Russia-China-Iran-Belarus axis, other countries in Africa, South America and Asia are not shifting in Russia\u2019s favour. This shows that, ultimately, within UN agencies, neither China, nor Trump\u2019s United States, nor Russia dictate outcomes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the vote reveals a further divide, one between the White House and US civil society. Representatives of workers and employers both voted against the Russian amendments, in contrast to their government. \u201cThe worker group has consistently voted as a bloc against Russian and Chinese amendments on Ukraine,\u201d confirmed Jeffrey Vogt, the Geneva-based delegate for US workers and director of the rule of law programme at the Solidarity Center in Washington. The same was true for US employers. Their ILO representative, Thomas Mackall, declined to comment on the US government vote.<\/p>\n
The ILO has, however, still not relinquished its Moscow office, which serves as a subregional bureau and has been the subject of growing discontent within the organisation. For four years, Kyiv has unsuccessfully called for its closure. At the latest session, 41 governments \u2013 mostly European, including Switzerland \u2013 issued a statement to introduce an amendment calling for an end to this presence in Russia. The initiative, led by Poland, failed to secure unanimity among European Union member states due to Hungary\u2019s veto. The amendment was not put to a vote, reportedly because of reluctance within the ILO leadership, under pressure from Moscow and Beijing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At a recent ILO meeting, a new Russia-China-US bloc has emerged, seeking to edit a European-backed text on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":613108,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,12,194778,3,1206,9423,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-613107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-donald-trump","tag-ilo","tag-news","tag-russia","tag-ukraine-war","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=613107"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613107\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/613108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=613107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=613107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=613107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}