UN General Assembly
1999

in order significantly to reduce our debt and increase the flow of productive investment to our continent and to establish, if not a Marshall Plan for Africa, at least a plan for financing its development. My delegation fervently hopes that, at the dawn of the twenty-first century, the opportunity will be found to revive international cooperation for development in order to build a more humane world. I am convinced that we have the means and the intelligence; we must also summon the political determination to do so. Thus, in order to improve interaction, Africa for its part has agreed to promote economic integration and to go one step further by creating a union of African States. This was the sense of the Syrte Declaration adopted on 9 September 1999 at the Fourth Extraordinary Summit of heads of State of the Organization of African Unity, convened on the happy initiative of Mr. Al-Qadhafi. I am convinced that the wealthy nations are clearly aware of their various and diverse responsibilities and that they will not shirk their obligations. Indeed, should they