Last week, during a State Department webinar with African journalists to discuss the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Assistant Secretary for African Affairs Molly Phee assured the group that "African voices matter in the international community, that your voices matter in the global conversation." But most of the journalists' questions were not sympathetic, and one journalist from Madagascar declared, "This is not our war."
A week earlier, at the UN General Assembly, where the African nations wield significant influence with 54 countries (28 percent of all votes), they were almost equally divided on the vote to condemn the Russian invasion. While 28 African nations voted for the resolution and only one (Eritrea) voted against, 17 others abstained and eight were absent.
