The call is clear for reallocation of resources, for eliminating the debt burden, not for lending resources. Nations allocate more for debt payment than for basic social services, and it costs more to pay the debt than is received in development aid. IN an age of wealth, poverty is obscene. Poverty is a gross violation of human rights. It is a denial of basic economic rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Poverty is a form of violence and a primary cause of violent conflict.
I propose that our new social contract should make it an international crime for any nation to spend more on its military budget than on its health and education budgets combined. It would make it illegal for any state to ship weapons of any kind, not only to states that are in gross violation of human rights, but to states that deny their children adequate education and health care. Military budgets do not make peace. They contribute to poverty. At this conference thus far, no one has mentioned disarmament.