Is New Zealand covertly supporting the glorification of neo-Nazism?

Ukrainian veterans of the Azov Battalion, formed by a white supremacist and banned from receiving U.S. aid, attend a rally in Kyiv on March 14, 2020. Source “Ukraine’s Nazi problem is real, even if Putin’s ‘denazification’ claim isn’t” Vladimir Sindeyeve / NurPhoto via Getty Images.

That’s what it looks like if we consider the changes in New Zealand’s voting behaviour at the UN General Assembly.

This month New Zealand changed its voting behaviour on the annual resolution on “Combating glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fueling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.” Whereas in the past our country had chosen to abstain from this resolution, this year it voted against it.

The voting record shows that a year ago only two countries, the USA and Ukraine, voted against this resolution (Green in favour, Yellow abstained and red agianst

This November the numbers voting with the US and Ukraine to effectively oppose the combating of the glorification of Naazim rose from 2 to 52 – including New Zealand.

The European Union countries refer to the war in Ukraine to justify their change in their vote (see “EU Explanation of Vote – UN General Assembly: Draft Resolution on Combating glorification of Nazism.” Traditionally abstaining, this year they voted to oppose the resolution.

It appears that this war somehow means we should not combat the glorification of Nazism. But what has changed? Surely our attitude to the glorification of Nazis should remain strong. It should not be affected, or thrown away, because of this war – or by the propaganda and geopolitical pressures accompanying it.

Surely our principles should be a lot stronger than this.

This worries me. The outbreak of the war has brought home to me that many of our principles seem to be shallow. We have willingly accepted censorship. We don’t speak out about the effective racism in blaming the population of a country for the decisions of its leaders, we have fallen into the trap of collective responsibility. Our principles on the sanctity of ownership have been abandoned in the rush to impose and support sanctions that amount to great power robbery. And all rational thought on the war gets jumped on. A real discussion of the Ukrainian war, its causes, and its consequences has become impossible.

This vote raises an important question. We changed our vote without consulting our people or political representatives. The change was in response to great power pressure (as many votes in the US are). It was not a democratic decision.

If we vote this way over such a fundamental question related to our values simply because the USA and other NATO countries pressure us to – what has happened to our sovereignty?