UN General Assembly
2024

As Dag Hammarskjold said: “The pursuit of peace and progress cannot end in a few years in either victory or defeat. The pursuit of peace and progress, with its trials and its errors, its successes and its setbacks, can never be relaxed and never abandoned.” In Europe the average life expectancy is just over eighty years. The UN will only have life expectancy longer than that, if we all recommit to its future. As the saying goes, I want reports of its death to be greatly exaggerated. Yes, we can’t ignore the fact that the architecture of the world’s collective security is under stress like never before. Voices of nationalism dismiss the need to work together. Instigators of conflict believe they can escape the wrath and the writ of the global community. Both couldn’t be more wrong. Acting to end conflict and relieve suffering is never easy. But that doesn’t mean we should stop trying.