UN General Assembly
1998

growth and financial enrichment, to be measured in statistics, which can sometimes be misleading and illusory. The totality of the human condition must be enhanced and improved. Our commitment and 24 responsibility towards economic and social development should not be minimized and made secondary to other issues which, though important, do not touch on the well- being of humanity. It is a grievous indictment on us that the age-old problems of grinding poverty and starvation still exist in today’s world. I appeal to the assembled nations not to allow ourselves to be beguiled or dazzled by the explosion of exciting new technologies, the seductive blandishments of global trade and high finance to the extent that the poor, the deprived, the desperate fall away from our agenda into the limbo of forgotten things. We must not forget that the least developed countries have special problems that cry out for attention. We must strive mightily, relentlessly, to banish these problems in the next century. The G-77 has proposed that a third world summit be