UN General Assembly
2008

international rule of law. The relaxation of tensions across the Taiwan Straits in the past few months serves as a positive example of how intractable problems from the past can be creatively transcended with wisdom, goodwill and patience. Sometimes impatience is its own worst enemy. After 90 years, the collapse of the Ottoman Empire has left some problems still unresolved in parts of its former domain. We cannot expect all the issues thrown up by the end of the cold war and the break-up of the Soviet Union to be quickly overcome. What we know is that, without the United Nations setting acceptable norms of behaviour, there will be many more problems in the world and some of the problems 11 08-53135 we now face will become far worse. Universally agreed human rights are important precisely because they underpin those norms of good behaviour. However, the realpolitik of big Power rivalry cannot simply be wished away; indeed, it has been part of the human condition for most of our history. However, we can confine that rivalry and, by a