Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 6 December 2016 to Question 55858, what progress has been made by his Department on securing amendments to UN General Assembly Resolution 70/140 in order for the Government to support that resolution.

As stated in our answer in response to Question 55858, the Government remains firmly committed to the global fight against racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance. The UK, along with EU partners, abstained in the vote on the resolution "Combating glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fuelling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance" in November 2016 as we considered the resolution, tabled by the Russian Federation, to be unbalanced and politically motivated. Furthermore, the resolution did not address all contemporary forms of racism in a comprehensive way.

Negotiations on the text for the 72^nd session of the UN General Assembly will begin later this year. We will continue to engage on this issue with Russia, who table this resolution annually, and seek to secure further amendments when negotiations formally begin.