UN General Assembly
2009

13 November 2008 on the urgent need for genuine dialogue among religions with a view to creating a culture of peace. That initiative bolstered activities to raise the awareness of the international community to the need for preventive diplomacy on this key topic, in particular the World Conference on Dialogue, held in Madrid in July 2008, and the launching in July 2005 of the Alliance of Civilizations, under the auspices of the United Nations. We therefore believe that all of these initiatives in favour of dialogue among cultures, as well as those to come, point to the need to establish a permanent forum for dialogue among civilizations so as to draw peoples together. I now turn to world peace and security. The only sure way to attain lasting peace is the equitable settlement of conflicts within a reformed, more democratic and more credible Security Council. Together, we need to build a United Nations with a stronger mandate and greater representativity. In that regard, it would be preferable to entrust the prevention, management and settlement of local