UN General Assembly
2006

infection. Our women and children are among the millions of other faceless victims around the world, and, without help, we could one day face extinction. Climate change is already sabotaging many of the efforts being made to achieve sustainable development goals, augmenting poverty in developing countries, especially in the least developed countries and the small island developing States. There is new and strong evidence that most of the warming observed is attributable to human activities. As the polar ice caps melt, my low-lying island country faces a second kind of extinction, that of disappearing beneath the waves of the ocean. I cannot continue without again asking the Assembly why a country of 23 million people is not represented at the United Nations, where every country is supposed to have one vote. I refer here to Taiwan, an established democracy whose people live in freedom and in peace. Their dynamic and technologically advanced economy is a model for creating wealth in today’s global economy. Taiwan is also an excellent world citizen, generous in humanitarian and development aid.