UN General Assembly
1989

The failure to make progress on nuclear disarmament had distorted the fabric of international life. Seemingly intractable conflicts proliferated in many parts of the world. The peace-keeping machinery of the United Nations lay almost dormant and apparently dismissed. In our own region, the South Pacific, we watched anxiously the process of decolonisation and self-determination in New Caledonia, where violence seemed imminent. Sadly, these fears proved well founded. In South Africa, the regime in Pretoria continued year by year its unremitting and abhorrent practice of apartheid and its illegal occupation of Namibia. In 1985 there was all too much evidence that respect for international law and the basic norms of the United Nations Charter were being ignored. We saw the International Court being treated with cynical disdain. There was a steady erosion of State willingness to accept the rule of law and compulsory jurisdiction. New Zealand itself, in 1985, had been the victim of an unlawful act of force during the Rainbow Warrior incident. I was obliged to draw that incident to the Assembly's attention in some detail.