UN General Assembly suspends Russia from Human Rights Council
A retrospective on the vote of 7 April 2022, held amid global outrage over the killings in Bucha.
What did the world do about Bucha on 7 April 2022? In one answer, the UN General Assembly voted to suspend Russia's membership of the UN Human Rights Council, amid global outrage over the killings in the town.
The vote was 93 countries in favour and 24 against, with 58 abstentions.
The condemnation had been building in the days before. On 6 April 2022, Pope Francis denounced the Bucha massacre at his weekly audience at the Vatican. He called for an end to the war, urged that weapons fall silent and demanded an end to sowing death and destruction, as reported at the time.
Humanitarian efforts remained difficult. On 5 April 2022, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said Russian forces had turned back an evacuation convoy heading for Mariupol. Even so, 11 humanitarian corridors were due to open on 6 April 2022, including routes from Mariupol, Berdiansk, Tokmak, Enerhodar, Huliaipole and Melitopol to Zaporizhzhia, and from Sievierodonetsk, Lysychansk, Popasna, Rubizhne and Hirske to Bakhmut.
Elsewhere, on 7 April 2022, Kazakhstan announced it would lift its COVID-19 travel restrictions at its borders with Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Uzbekistan.
