UN General Assembly
1974

163. The demand for a new order of international economic justice has been nowhere louder than at the United Nations Conference recently convened in Caracas to work out a new regime for the control of the resources of the sea, My country put forward the view that the formulation of the principles of any regime governing the use of the sea may well depend on the willingness of the developed maritime countries to accept the fact that the rules of the traditional freedoms of the sea as at present interpreted by them have to give way to a new and revised order based on political and economic justice. Developing countries must exercise sovereignty and control over the marine resources within their national jurisdictions, while at the same time accepting responsibility for ensuring that the traditional interests of the community of nations in the areas of their sea are respected and protected. It is to be hoped that whenever the new regime that will govern the use of the sea is finally elaborated there will be an effective expression of political and economic justice on the sea -justice which, regrettably, we cannot say now exists on land.