UN General Assembly
2001

continues to take the lives of thousands of innocent people. What is more, the Government of Burundi remains devoted to the goal of the total elimination of weapons of mass destruction, whether they be nuclear, chemical or biological. To have peace and security prevail required adopting a working strategy for conflict prevention, with a view to understanding fully the motives and dynamics of confrontation and to curing this evil at its root. It also means resolutely attacking the structural causes that drive people to revolt, namely ignorance, want, disease, extreme poverty, underdevelopment and its corollaries, and inequities in the distribution of wealth. There is a chain directly linking desperate acts and the fanaticism bred of frustration and humiliation. Thus, the imbalance between the North and the South is unlikely to promote harmonious equilibrium. Indeed, on the basis of available statistics, more than one third of mankind lives in absolute poverty. This is liable to grow worse if the rich countries continue not to shoulder their responsibilities in terms of aid for development. Improving the living conditions of people