UN General Assembly
1975

212. Reflecting on all the issues which I have touched upon, and all the many others which I have necessarily omitted to mention, I feel overawed by the realization that for 30 years now the post-war world has been making this most elaborate pilgrimage to this General Assembly of an institution which a frightened world fashioned as some answer to its fears of self-destruction. It is an extraordinary aspect of the human situation that we seem endowed in equal measure with the capacity to be persuaded towards self-destruction and towards self-preservation. As we mark our thirtieth anniversary, then, the Ghana delegation wishes to be associated with the prayer that the counsels that make for self-preservation may receive an accretion of strength. The perils that looked so very distressing in the times immediately bordering the war period are still very much with us, although these may appear in subtler forms, shapes and shades. In the war period, our perils took the naked form of a gigantic armed conflict. Since then, they have taken the forms of political, social and economic upheavals. But naked or subtle, they all make the world an unsafe abode. Similarly, the same insidious forces of prejudice, intolerance and cynicism which virtually made the League of Nations stillborn are also shadowing and stalking our present world Organization. These conditions manifestly call for our re-dedication to our pledge of united strength, resourcefulness and vigilance.