But the international community must do more. Our words must be turned into concrete steps to help protect those who provide aid and assistance. Mr. President, the General Assembly is considering resolutions under the present agenda item about a number of specific humanitarian emergencies. Efforts to rebuild and develop the region must begin immediately. The traditional development actors should be involved early.
Every situation requires the humanitarian community to assess priorities of action.
Too often, humanitarian relief organizations are caught with the task of beginning to rebuild an area which they have rescued from crisis. This is not an efficient use of resources and abilities. The humanitarian community and member states of the UN must think in strategic terms about the scope of a problem and how best to tackle it. Of course, there is usually little time to engage in long policy exercises when we must respond to an emergency. For this reason, we support the Secretary-General's establishment of, among others, the Executive Committee for Humanitarian Affairs to bring together the UN humanitarian team.