UN General Assembly
1990

Today it is perhaps easier to see that, while the Assembly cannot elude the task of reacting to the immediate problems of international peace, especially the maintenance of the security of Member States, it would be equally wrong to lose sight or track of prospects likely to bear fruit in a slightly broader perspective. Ad hoc reactions to crises have to be fitted into a more pro-active approach to global security, a concept that has now to be used in a sense broad enough to include environmental and economic survival. For that reason, the topics raised by the Prime Minister in his statement last year have, if anything, become even more relevant. The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development to be held in 1992, in which so many high expectations have been placed, offers an opportunity for the international community to address the global ecological challenges that confront mankind.