France, Sept. 5 -- The resolution was sponsored by African states to counter perceptions that the continent is peripheral.

It passed with the support of 164 nations, including France. The United States was the only vote against the move. Estonia, Georgia, Lithuania, Moldova, Serbia and Ukraine abstained.

Togo led the initiative to further the African Union campaign to limit use of the Mercator projection, named after a 16th-century Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator.

Designed for maritime navigation, it increases distortion the further a region lies from the equator.

Since Africa and South America both straddle the equator, they seem smaller than their actual size, while Russia, North America and Greenland appear much larger.

"Th...