ANC YOUTH LEAGUE IS CONCERNED BY THE ROLE PLAYED BY SOUTH AFRICA IN THE UNITED NATIONS SECURITY COUNCIL ON THE LIBYAN SITUATION.

The African National Congress Youth League is concerned by the role played by South Africa in the United Nations Security Council. South Africa voted in favour of UN Security Council Resolution 1973 to impose a No-Fly-Zone in Libya, and did not advocate for a peaceful solution or an African led solution to the political challenges confronting Libya.

South Africa voted in favour of the No-Fly-Zone in Libya, whilst its allies in BRICS, (Brazil, China, India, and Russian Federation) abstained, because they noticed the inconsistencies being applied to Libya. The UN Security Council Resolution 1973 is inconsistent, but also rushed because there was no exhaustion of a peaceful process to resolve the political situation in Libya.

In Bahrain and Yemen, governments of those countries unleashed violence against civilians and tried to crack down on the legitimate concerns and protests of the people, yet there is no resolution to impose certain things to those countries. Saudi Arabia has violated UN Conventions by illegally interfering on the domestic issues of Bahrain through sending of troops to crack-down legitimate protests and the UN never said anything about it.

The ANC Youth League is of the view that whilst presented as a means of protecting Libyan civilians, the UN resolution and imposition of a No-Fly-Zone in Libya is meant to impose the West's takeover of Libya, because of its Oil endowments. It is evident that certain powers, particularly the US, UK and France want to impose a puppet government in Libya so that they can have access to its oil reserves and capacity, like the US did through the illegal war it waged against Iraq in 2003.

The ANC Youth League does not agree with the excessive usage of violence by the State over civilians, and undemocratic practices all over the world, but will never agree with anything that undermines the sovereignty of countries by Western powers whose aim is to loot natural resources, in this case the oil in Libya.

The ANC Youth League expects the ANC government and its representatives in the United Nations to understand these principles and at all time avoid being used by the United States to undermine the sovereignty of other countries for its narrow purposes. The South African government is expected to always propagate for African solutions to African problems and not allow for the outsourcing of the resolution of domestic politics to Western powers.

The ANC Youth League will strongly raise our concern over South Africa's foreign policy and outlook within ANC structures and with the department of international relations and corporation. We have to raise these concerns because as youth, we will never agree with a South Africa which will be positioned as an imperialist weakest link to the African continent. The ANC Youth League does not and will never agree with any resolution of the Libyan situation through violence by the US led forces, in as much as we do not agree with the usage of violence by the Libyan government.

Statement issued by the ANC Youth League, March 21 2011

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