I should like to join the speakers who have
preceded me at this rostrum in offering you, Sir, on behalf
of my delegation and on my own behalf, warm and hearty
congratulations on your election to the presidency of the
General Assembly at its fiftieth regular session. I am
particularly pleased that the President of the General
Assembly is the representative of Portugal, a friendly
country with which my country, the Republic of Zaire, has
long enjoyed excellent relations marked by trust and mutual
respect. We feel that your intellectual abilities and
diplomatic skills, together with your long experience of
international affairs, guarantee the success of our work
here.
My congratulations go also to the other elected
members of the Bureau, and I wish them every success in
their delicate task of providing you with assistance.
Allow me also to pay tribute to your predecessor,
His Excellency Mr. Essy Amara, Minister for Foreign
Affairs of the sister Republic of Côte d’Ivoire, to whom
I am bound by long-standing ties of personal friendship.
I should like to express to him our joy and pride on
seeing how masterfully he guided the work of the General
Assembly at its forty-ninth regular session and our
appreciation of the energy, skill and ability with which he
discharged his mandate.
Finally, I should like to pay a well-deserved tribute
to the Secretary-General, Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, for
his excellent preparatory work for this session, his
outstanding efforts to strengthen the role of the United
Nations and his many commendable initiatives in support
of international peace and security.
My thoughts here will turn mainly to the lessons of
50 years of the existence of the United Nations; the
revitalization and restructuring of the United Nations; the
situation in the subregion of the Great Lakes, particularly
Rwanda and Burundi; the efforts for peace in the Middle
East; the support of the United Nations system for efforts
by Governments to promote and strengthen new or
restored democracies; external debt, international
economic cooperation and development; disarmament
efforts; and, finally, the question of the return or
restoration of cultural property to its country of origin.
This year the United Nations is commemorating its
fiftieth anniversary. When it was founded, it set itself
goals that corresponded to the enthusiasm, hopes and
needs that emerged with the end of a devastating war
whose traumatic effects have not yet faded away entirely.

Those goals were to maintain international peace and
security, guarantee justice and human rights, foster social
progress and establish better living conditions in greater
freedom.
Where do we stand today?
A fiftieth anniversary is an important milestone in the
life of persons, institutions and nations. A person who has
made nothing of his life by the time he is 50 is not likely
to set a new course for his life afterwards. An institution
that after 50 years has done nothing to attain the objectives
it set when it was founded inevitably raises the question of
its viability and the usefulness of its existence. A nation
that has done nothing for its people in 50 years must surely
step back and re-examine everything — its political leaders,
programmes, social projects, management and methods.
Fortunately, this is not the case of the United Nations.
It has some outstanding accomplishments to its credit. It
has achieved real successes and made real efforts in the
areas of economic and social development, decolonization,
human rights, development and peace-keeping. Its work in
establishing norms indisputably represents the highest
aspirations of man, of all mankind and all peoples, for a
world free from war, threats, intimidation, poverty,
oppression and suffering.
Today, therefore, the United Nations must preserve
and consolidate its accomplishments while also adapting
itself to face the new challenges borne in the wake of the
astonishing transformations the world has undergone since
the end of the Second World War.
For those of us from Africa, decolonization was an
extremely important page in this story. What would
decolonization have been without the United Nations,
particularly the adoption of resolution 1514 (XV), the
Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial
Countries and Peoples? What would have happened in
South Africa without the mobilization by the United
Nations of the entire international community against the
scourge of apartheid, and without its support for the heroic
and legitimate struggle of the South African people under
the leadership of the recognized liberation movements,
particularly the African National Congress (ANC)?
In Zaire we have not forgotten that 34 years and 10
days ago, striving to promote peace and restore and
maintain the political independence and territorial integrity
of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which is today
Zaire, one of the most devoted servants of the United
Nations, its late Secretary-General, Dag Hammarskjöld,
died at Ndola.
We have not forgotten that from July 1960 to June
1964 the United Nations Operation in the Congo
represented the largest assistance programme undertaken
by the United Nations up to that time.
And so it is thanks to this major contribution by the
United Nations that Zaire preserved its unity and
territorial integrity. Let me extend to the United Nations
the deep appreciation of the Zairian people for this. That
page in our history, which is also a page in the history of
the United Nations, reminds us that our people paid a
heavy price for peace, and it made a pledge that the
generations must hand down from one to another: no
more civil war; no more secessions because of tribal,
inter-ethnic or power conflicts; a firm commitment to
peace and dialogue for development, whatever the nature
or the intensity of our internal differences.
That is why we gave the name of Dag
Hammarskjöld to an important bridge in the city of
Kinshasa, to pay tribute to the United Nations by
immortalizing the memory of the Secretary-General who
died on the battlefield in the struggle for peace. The
symbol of the bridge derives from our understanding of
the message of the United Nations. As an opening on the
world and forum of nations, is not the United Nations,
with its message of peace and dialogue, building a bridge
between nations?
And yet, despite the outstanding progress
indisputably made throughout the world, many other
things have also happened. The cold war has ended
without this being much help to the development process
in the countries of the South, particularly in Africa, where
poverty has increased in a worsening economic and social
situation.
In the wake of this worsening situation, Africa, in
particular, is experiencing the reappearance of diseases
which had been eradicated and the appearance of new
endemic diseases, without having the necessary resources
to cope with them.
Decolonization is virtually over now. Apartheid has
been abolished, and Africa, facing the new challenges of
democratization and development, seized by the fever of
democratization, is undergoing irreversible change
accompanied by new difficulties.
2

At the international level, new kinds of domination are
emerging, and could lead to the same results as those of the
past, if we are not careful. Will “globalization” of people’s
behaviour and standardization of reflexes and needs
imprison freedom, stifle identities and crush the cultural
expression of peoples?
There has been no Third World War, but, as in former
Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Burundi and elsewhere, a new kind of
war has emerged, based on ethnic and tribal “cleansing”,
tragic consequences for security, peace, the environment
and the development of nations that are very disturbing.
A new kind of international crime is engulfing Africa
and the world: violence — attacks on individuals and their
property, armed robbery and highway robbery; economic
and financial crime — counterfeiting, money-laundering,
illicit drug trafficking, large-scale fraud in commodities and
so forth; political crime — fundamentalism and
international terrorism, which take us back to the times of
the pirates and the corsairs. Of course the telegraph, the
telephone, air travel, radio, television, computers and videos
have done a great deal to shrink distances, but they have
also helped to strengthen the forces of disorder.
Multilateral cooperation, development financing and
the spirit of international solidarity have all been frittered
away. The new international economic order has not
emerged, and bilateral cooperation has been halted for
various reasons, some political in many countries, such as
Zaire, at the precise moment when those countries are faced
with a sharp reduction in financial resources. The
conditions attached to development aid are more stringent
than ever, and assistance for democratization, strongly
encouraged at the La Baule Summit, is also subject to
conditionalities.
The phenomenon of refugees and displaced persons is
now unprecedented in scope.
A century of hope, particularly the last half of the
century, would thus seem to be ending on a note of despair
when we look at what the causes of the new threat to world
peace in general and peace in Africa in particular are:
armed conflicts, serious internal struggles, poverty,
unemployment, inequality, discrimination, intolerance,
policies of exclusion, the struggle against State despotism,
political and social failures, and so on.
To those who are seeking refuge from tyranny we can
also add — on our continent those who are fleeing anarchy.
The tragic fate of persons displaced because of civil war or
violence is one of the major humanitarian problems of our
age. There are many armed conflicts today which derive
from the struggle between communities swept along by
intolerance.
It is therefore imperative that the members of the
international community shoulder their responsibilities,
help each other and act together to reverse these negative
trends.
As the Secretary-General of the United Nations
noted on 20 October 1994, quite rightly:
“Societies that used to think they were completely
autonomous now know that they are very closely
linked to one another. The life of each individual,
wherever he may come from, is today part of a
planetary whole. Today it is recognized that the
loftiest objectives of mankind — peace, justice and
prosperity — can be attained only if an increasingly
broadly agreed effort is made. And then a whole
series of new problems whose worldwide dimensions
are quite clear demand solutions that no one country
or group of countries can find in isolation.”
In order to cope with the new challenges facing us
all, with the problems of development, peace and security,
the United Nations has to rethink its methods, its
organization, and its effectiveness.
The influx of nearly 3 million Rwandese refugees to
eastern Zaire, about which I shall speak later, revealed to
us some of the shortcomings of the United Nations
system faced with new challenges.
First, 30,000 armed men belonging to the former
armed forces of Rwanda came to Zaire on 14 July 1994,
and obviously we were not expecting them. They came to
regions of North and South Kivu following the civil war
in Rwanda. After being disarmed, they were supposed to
be taken care of. But by whom? Problems arose as to
their status.
Were they prisoners of war? Zaire was not at war
with Rwanda, we were told. Were they war detainees?
“No”, we were told by the International Committee of the
Red Cross (ICRC), “they are not within our competence.”
Are they, then, political refugees? “No”, the Office of the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) replied. “Men in military uniform are not
political refugees, and so they do not fall within our
competence.”
3

And so, the 30,000 military men of the former
Rwandan armed forces began to take care of themselves, to
the detriment of the villagers and local populations, while
the United Nations system looked on, powerless.
Secondly, at the behest of the Secretary-General and
the international community, we agreed to move them far
away from our border with Rwanda, for obvious reasons.
So we found sites in Shaba, Maniema and Equateur. Joint
United Nations-Zaire evaluation missions were sent to these
regions.
Assuming that there were three people in each family,
we identified 90,000 individuals belonging to the former
Rwandan Army to be moved from the Rwandan border.
Having seen this evaluation, the United Nations
declared the cost exorbitant, and the Secretary-General was
unable to find the financial resources needed. So, the idea
was abandoned and the United Nations asked Zaire to take
appropriate security measures and to keep the 30,000
military men where they were, namely on the border with
Rwanda.
But, leaving them there made the Kigali Government
nervous about possible destabilization, and so it began
spreading unfounded accusations against Zaire. Without
checking the facts at all, the United Nations then
recognized Kigali’s claims and lifted the arms embargo on
Rwanda which had been established pursuant to Security
Council resolution 1011 (1995) of 16 August 1995, in order
to help that country protect itself against some hypothetical
threat, but the United Nations has done nothing at all about
the 30,000 military men left to be cared for by Zaire
without any assistance.
And what is more, after lifting the arms embargo on
Rwanda on 16 August 1995 so that it could arm itself and
deal with the threat of destabilization from Zaire, the
Security Council adopted resolution 1013 (1995) two weeks
later setting up an international Commission of Inquiry to
look into allegations that the former Rwandan Government
forces were being trained and supplied with weapons from
Zaire in order to destabilize Rwanda. This is all quite
astonishing, not least because the highest level of the
collective security system of the United Nations was
involved. I myself have served on the Security Council. I
was President during the Malvinas war and I have always
believed that at that level of responsibility, matters should
be considered with the utmost care.
Either the Security Council has proof and takes
action, the setting up of an investigative commission
being now irrelevant; or the Security Council has no
proof, so it investigates and takes a decision after it has
checked the facts. The credibility of our Organization is
at stake here. These are just two cases showing the
inability of the United Nations to deal with the new
challenges.
The much-needed revitalization of the United
Nations depends on the interest and the efficacy it shows
in dealing with conflicts and complex situations that call
for its intervention.
The same holds true for its restructuring. Fifty years
after its inception, the United Nations needs to adjust and
adapt to the new challenges facing the world today,
including economic and social development; political
conflicts against a backdrop of ethnic cleansing; changes
affecting international relations; and the changes that have
taken place in the world since 24 October 1945; the need
to enlarge the circle of decision-makers in matters of
international peace and security; the need to ensure more
equitable and balanced representation of the nations of the
world on the Security Council and to avoid any danger of
the collective security system being manipulated; and the
inadequacy of the financial resources to cover the scale of
the tasks facing this universal Organization.
This therefore seems to be the cost of ensuring a
new dynamism in United Nations activities, for this
changing world is not exactly reassuring. And many
events are taking place without the nations of the world
knowing why or how. There is a danger that political
lobbies may use the cogs of the United Nations
machinery to their own ends, using their influence,
without any counterbalance, and that certain Governments
may bring pressure to bear on the United Nations. This
slippery slope was certainly not foreseen when the
collective security system was established.
The Republic of Zaire welcomes the current peace
process in the Middle East. We noted with satisfaction the
agreements signed between the State of Israel and the
Palestine Liberation Organization on the one hand and
between Israel and Jordan on the other. To our mind,
these are important steps towards the establishment of an
overall peace.
Zaire wholeheartedly supports the bilateral
negotiations and the progress made thus far in the peace
process and urges all parties to implement the agreements.
4

We trust that efforts will be made to ensure that further
negotiations are held soon between Israel and other Arab
States.
Emphasizing the need to ensure progress in Arab-
Israeli negotiations in other directions of the peace process,
the Republic of Zaire would urge the establishment of
dialogue between the protagonists, and encourage them to
do their utmost to reach agreements that reflect the
legitimate aspirations of each side.
This is the only way in which we will be able to
overcome an age-old distrust and create the conditions
needed for progress and development in the Middle East, in
the spirit of peace that has been so long in coming.
The situation in the Great Lakes subregion in Central
Africa is of great concern in the Republic of Zaire because
it calls into question the peace, stability, security and
development, not just of Rwanda and Burundi, but of the
region as a whole.
The Republic of Zaire, I wish to emphasize, has no
particular problem with Rwanda or with Burundi.
Yesterday, Zaire offered refuge to the Tutsis who were
driven from their home and today we are offering refuge to
those who have left their country. A human tragedy of an
unprecedented scale is unfolding in this region. Everything
borders on the extreme, including the urge to exclude other
people; the hatred that pits the fraternal enemies, the Tutsis
and the Hutus, against each other; the dramatic
peregrinations of people who are hounded because of their
ethnic origins or political opinions; the ease with which
human lives are destroyed, including the lives of children,
women, old people, and intellectuals; the instinct for
violence; the scale of the flow of people searching for
shelter, fleeing certain death; the imbalance in the division
of political and military power and the rejection of
democratic principles in the running of the country.
As former Tutsi refugees from 1959 and from 1962-
1963 are returning home, thanks to the return to power of
the Rwandan Patriotic Front (FPR), it is now the turn of
millions of Hutus, who represent 85 per cent of the
population, to leave their country, abandoning their
property, their land and their houses to the newcomers.
The Tutsis, who were forced out in the 1960s at the
height of the Hutus’ power, and who account for 15 per
cent of the population, took 30 years to prepare their
forcible return to power. How long does the international
community want to wait until it is the turn of the Hutu
majority to return to power using force?
Every time there is this kind of swing, new human
dramas will be condemned and major problems of
reinsertion and reinstallation will emerge.
In this cycle of deliberate violence, it will become
increasingly impossible to say who is innocent of
something and who is not guilty of something.
Faced with a tragedy of such magnitude, the
international community and the United Nations seem to
us to be rather helpless. Who then will take the necessary
measures to help these countries, to prevent their situation
from deteriorating, to preserve peace and security in the
region and to prevent further genocide?
The resolutions and declarations adopted to date by
the United Nations do not take account of all the realities
on the ground. They do not cover all the aspects of the
tragedy that I have just described that exists in Rwanda,
Burundi and in the subregion of the Great Lakes as a
whole. And these resolutions and declarations have
political implications that contribute to the region’s
instability.
No purpose can be served at the stage where we are
today by quoting lofty principles or deciding who is right
on the basis of who can best present their version of the
situation and the facts. Instead, we must objectively
define the concrete problems facing Rwanda and Burundi
as States and take specific measures, within the
framework of an overall approach to the question, to
ensure the repatriation of refugees; national reconciliation;
power-sharing; the establishment of the needed balance in
the armies that now constitute the political support of
Governments, in order to create republican armed forces;
the establishment or revitalization of the democratization
process; assistance in reintegrating refugees into society;
reconstruction and development assistance for the
countries of origin and of asylum; and, finally, the
establishment of viable judicial structures, so that there
can be some justice. There is indeed a justice problem,
and it must be solved.
It is in this spirit that the Republic of Zaire supports
the holding of a regional conference on peace, stability
and security in the Great Lakes subregion, following the
signing of bilateral agreements on the repatriation of
refugees. If this conference is to succeed, it must, for
obvious reasons, be planned very carefully. The
5

Government of Zaire welcomed the appointment by the
Secretary-General of the United Nations of Ambassador
Jesus to the post of Special Envoy. Zaire will cooperate
fully with him in order to ensure the success of his mission.
I should like also to draw the Assembly’s attention to
the fact that the influx of Rwandese refugees into eastern
Zaire, an event unheard of since the end of the Second
World War, appears to have been relegated to the back
pages of international news now that its sensationalist
aspect has worn thin. The refugees destroyed a priceless
national heritage: the national park of Virunga, a site listed
by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) as a national treasure. The local
flora and fauna — mountain gorillas, elephants and other
protected species — were not spared. The environment, the
ecology, and basic sanitary and educational infrastructures
were destroyed. General Assembly resolution 49/24 of 2
December 1994, on special assistance to countries —
including Zaire — receiving refugees to help restore the
areas destroyed by the massive presence of refugees, has so
far had no impact or follow-up whatsoever.
Zaire, a victim of the tragedy in Rwanda by virtue of
their common border, has been accused, with increasing
frequency, of attempting to destabilize Rwanda. The
accusers are none other than those who wish to use the
refugee question to destabilize the Great Lakes area in
order to live out their dream of creating a new Ima empire
that would challenge the principle, inherited from colonized
times, of the inviolability of borders; they would attempt to
resolve the ethnic conflicts in the region by distributing
land here and there — all this to the detriment of Zaire.
This approach shows that a political issue underlies the
whole problem. Either we are dealing with refugees, in the
true sense of the word, and then their massive presence and
the destruction they have wrought in our country cause our
people a serious safety and security problem — which
would entitle us to invoke the exception envisaged in the
Declaration on Territorial Asylum; or we are dealing with
people quietly expelled from their country for political and
ethnic reasons, in which case, since no constitution in the
world would allow a country to expel its citizens for ethnic
or political reasons, we do not have to accept these
castaways of “ethnic cleansing”. That is why, in order that
the pretext of Zaire’s supposed attempt to destabilize
Rwanda not give certain countries the opportunity to carry
out a plot against my country, Zaire — in the wake of the
lifting of the arms embargo on Rwanda, which was decided
on by the Security Council, and in the face of the
jeopardizing of our national security and the serious threats
that face our population — resorted to one of the existing
international instruments concerning refugees, namely
General Assembly resolution 2312 (XXII), of 14
December 1967, the Declaration on Territorial Asylum, to
urge the international community and the United Nations
to shoulder their responsibilities, because Zaire does not
have the means to bear alone the burden of the massive
presence of refugees in its territory, particularly since it
is on the eve of holding elections.
I would recall, since much has been said about this,
that the second preambular paragraph of the Declaration
on Territorial Asylum states that a person faced with
persecution
“has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries
asylum from persecution”
and paragraph 1 of article 3 states that such a person shall
not be
“subjected to measures such as rejection at the
border or, if he has already entered the territory in
which he seeks asylum, expulsion or compulsory
return”.
Since 1960, Zaire has been taking in refugees from
Rwanda — sometimes Tutsi, sometimes Hutu — and we
have always followed that provision to the letter. But
paragraph 2 of article 3 states:
“Exception may be made to the foregoing principle
only for overriding reasons of national security or in
order to safeguard the population, as in the case of
a mass influx of persons”.
And if a State should decide that, for whatever
reason, an exception to that provision is justified, it can
“consider the possibility of granting to the person
concerned an opportunity of going to another State”,
and can then bring this matter before the international
community.
This is precisely the situation that Zaire found itself
in. It decided to be an exception to the principle, and so
informed the Secretary-General and the Security Council
of the United Nations. Countries wishing to take in these
refugees are welcome to do so, but Zaire refuses to
continue to be accused of destabilizing Rwanda simply
because we accepted 3 million Rwandese on our land. We
6

wish to cut out at the root the trumped-up charges against
our country. In this way, the international community will
be able to judge better our determination to live in peace
with our neighbours.
However, acceding to the request by the Secretary-
General of the United Nations, the Zaire Government held
talks with Mrs. Sadako Ogata, the head of the Office of the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR), and asked her to organize, on the UNHCR level,
a voluntary repatriation, on a massive and uninterrupted
scale, of the refugees to their countries of origin, so that by
31 December 1995 all of the refugees would have returned
home.
The international community has an obligation to help
Rwanda and Burundi to deal with the problems of
repatriation and reinsertion of their nationals. During our
last meeting in Geneva on 25 September 1995, we agreed
with Rwanda’s Minister of Rehabilitation and with Mrs.
Ogata on the modalities for repatriating the refugees by 31
December, to the tune of 8,000 to 10,000 persons per day,
at various points of entry, which were identified —
Shangugu, Kiseni or Gibumba.
We can think of no Government that would hesitate as
to what course to take if it had to choose between the
requirements of international solidarity and those of national
security and the protection of its population.
To judge by the information that appears in the
international press, the impression that some wish to give
of Zaire is that it is a hell where it would not be very
pleasant to live.
Zaireans are human beings. Like human beings
anywhere, some are good and some are bad, some not so
good and not so bad. We are also a people. Whatever one
thinks of me personally, or of any other politician in my
country, this cannot be allowed to discredit an entire
people, or affect the image of my people as a whole.
When many fled the horrors and the violence of war,
it was to the “hell” of Zaire that they chose to come and
live. But one might well wonder what would become of
peace in Central Africa if Zaire were incapable of
managing conflicts between tribes — we have more than
450, as well as our other internal political problems — and
if it exploded like Rwanda, spilling our 47 million people
into neighbouring countries.
For countries such as ours, that have experienced the
whole range of turbulence that a people can know —
above and beyond the colonial period, which more or less
persisted into the first years of independence, and the
price of building a post-colonial State in conformity with
the aspirations of our people — there is no greater good
in the world than peace. Without it, all illusions aside,
progress and development are out of the question.
In the name of peace, every State must be fully
responsible for its people and must learn to live with its
own national contradictions and refrain from obliging
others to bear the burden of its incapacity to manage
those contradictions. Otherwise, the international
community, both at the regional and global levels, must
come to its aid to develop its capacity to resolve its
problems without inflicting further wounds, and above all
without inflicting them on other countries, developing
countries like our own, whose resources are needed for
other purposes.
The international community thus has the duty and
should have the courage to impose peace and
reconciliation in the Great Lakes region and state clearly
its refusal to countenance the drift towards exclusion and
ethnicity.
Zaire shelters many African refugees on its territory
and, out of a sense of common humanity and an
appreciation of our historic ties with its neighbours,
decided to take in our Rwandese brothers. But we can no
longer pay for the tragedies that are engulfing our
neighbours, with all their economic and security
repercussions on our border population.
As I have said, we believe the international
community must do all it can to reassure our people by
helping the Governments of Rwanda and Burundi to make
all the necessary provisions to guarantee the speedy return
of the refugees and their reintegration in their homeland.
We reaffirm here our resolve to work for the restoration
of a climate of peace in our subregion and to make our
contribution towards all the efforts at reconciliation aimed
at strengthening mutual confidence and security there.
But we can no longer cope alone with those
refugees. We can no longer shoulder alone the
humanitarian burden imposed upon us by humanitarian
principles and the agreements we have signed.
On behalf of my Government, I should like to take
this opportunity to thank Mrs. Sadako Ogata and the
7

Executive Committee of the High Commissioner for
Refugees for the efforts they have been making with
limited resources to solve the problem of refugees in the
Great Lakes region and for their assistance in rehabilitating
the Bukavu airport and the port of Uvira.
Our thanks also go to the member States of the
European Union which have pledged contributions for the
repair of roads in North and South Kivu in advance of the
organization of elections.
In the 1960s, few governing structures in the countries
of the South demonstrated particular interest in or
attachment to the close connection that exists between
democracy and development; democracy and human rights;
and human rights and development.
With the passage of time, the difficult experience of
management has taught us some lessons. It makes more
sense to manage growth and wealth than degradation and
poverty; it is not enough to consume what others produce,
but one should learn to produce what one consumes;
inheriting infrastructure and ways of life conceived by
others is one thing, but conceiving one’s own communal
approach to life and to fix one’s own limits for oneself is
another.
In all things, it is the individual that remains the focus
and the medium. An individual whose rights and freedoms
are flouted, who is aware that he does not count in national
affairs, drifts away from the ruling circles and from the
national effort for development imposed on him from
above, from policies out of touch with his own daily life.
Many of our countries have, in the course of the last 30
years, experienced the indifference of the individual whose
rights and freedoms were left out of account.
Today, in the light of the economic and social
collapse, that link between human rights, democracy and
development is understood and acknowledged. It is not just
because of what was said at the conference at La Baule, but
because of the importance and the intensity of the message
we heard at La Baule, that the process of democratization
in Africa must also be understood as an act of awareness,
of self-awareness. That is how this process becomes truly
irreversible.
In the Republic of Zaire, five years of difficult
transition have done considerable damage at the political,
economic and social levels. That is why we have not been
able to play our full part in the arena of free nations.
Domestically, we have not been fully able to shoulder our
responsibilities to deal with the socio-economic
requirements of our people.
But now we have decided to bury the past and to
assume our duties to the full and to offer our contribution
to the solution of problems facing the international
community, if it be only through our analysis of the
situation.
We intend to strengthen ties with all friendly
countries, particularly our traditional friends, in finding
together appropriate solutions to the problems which have
beset our relations. At the same time, we mean to give
sustained, real and useful meaning to the diversification
of our external relations in the field of development.
Internally, through another kind of management, of
which the Prime Minister spoke in September 1994, and
in the context of restored liberties, we intend to meet the
aspirations of our people to a better quality of life. This
is a matter of priority.
Democracy does not mean licence, and the state of
laws implies that all citizens are subject without
discrimination to the law. In our countries, educating as
many people as possible, changing the way people think,
raising the general level of education and political and
democratic awareness — all of these draw upon the
limited financial resources of the State to strengthen,
following the forthcoming elections, democracy and the
state of law and of progress.
While the Government is seeking to create
conditions of legal security and an economic environment
favourable to the creation of fruitful partnerships and
mutually advantageous cooperation, we want to count on
our external partners and the international financial
institutions — in short, on the international community —
to take up with us the challenge of development. The
present institutional order in our country conforms to the
desires of our people as expressed through its political
class as a whole, and is designed to extricate us from the
crisis rationally and methodically. But our efforts alone
will not suffice. That is why we seek aid to accompany
the process of democratization, because, unfortunately, the
support of the people for political scenarios is also
important to finding a solution to their daily concerns.
As the Manila Declaration emphasizes, by mutual
support, the internal and external forces that endanger the
new democracy can be overcome. The United Nations
thus has a duty to support efforts by Governments,
8

including ours, to promote or consolidate new or
re-established democracies.
The eradication of extreme poverty in all countries,
particularly developing countries, has become one of the
priority development goals of the 1990s, in keeping with
resolutions 47/196 and 47/197. The year 1996 has been
proclaimed International Year for the Eradication of
Poverty. This honours our Organization.
Over the past 50 years, the United Nations has made
serious efforts to intensify international economic
cooperation. In particular, it has adopted the Charter of
Economic Rights and Duties of States and the Declaration
and Programme of Action on the Establishment of a New
International Economic Order based on justice and equity.
None the less, the trade relations between the developed
and the developing countries continue to show an imbalance
which, having been allowed to persist and grow, is today a
real threat to peace everywhere.
In Africa, efforts made at the national, subregional and
regional levels to break out of the vicious cycle of poverty
have not been sufficiently supported by the international
community. Stricken by an unprecedented crisis, Africa has
for years groaned under the weight of its debt. It has
suffered the effects of lowered commodity prices, of the
deterioration in the terms of trade, of protectionism in the
developed countries, and of a drop in official development
assistance.
The debt is a major hindrance to economic growth and
development in Africa. The heavy debt burden absorbs one
third of our countries’ export earnings and represents a
serious drain on resources which would otherwise have
served to finance growth and development.
In order to implement economic reform, stabilization
and structural adjustment programmes and to eradicate
poverty, the debtor developing countries need to mobilize
the resources necessary to their efforts. They also need new
supplies of financial resources and concessional financial
assistance from creditor countries and multilateral financial
institutions.
Debt relief is becoming increasingly unavoidable if
national resources are to be freed up to support activities
necessary to social development. The responsibilities which
debt and debt servicing impose on our developing countries
are so alarming that we must apply ourselves with
particular inventiveness and urgency to the search for
solutions to the problems to which they give rise. They
require a leap of imagination.
That is why we feel it to be necessary and urgent to
assess the progress made in the various United Nations
bodies in the establishment of a new international
economic order, so that, in response to the results of this
assessment, we can take appropriate measures to promote
development in developing countries and international
economic cooperation.
The Republic of Zaire hopes that, at this session, the
General Assembly, in the framework of agenda item 96
(c), on the external debt crisis and development, will take
into consideration the recommendations made by the
non-aligned countries at their meeting in Jakarta from 13
to 15 August 1994. It may find therein ways and means
of resolving the problem of the debt of developing
countries and of promoting their harmonious development.
Everyone knows that the external debt of the
developing countries cannot be absorbed at its current
level without the cooperation of the developed countries
and the international financial institutions, which must
agree on the establishment of a new world economic
order that would take the vital interests of its partners into
account. The countries of the North would also benefit by
making an additional effort to understand that the debtor
countries can only honour their debt-service obligations
according to their financial capacities. In the current
situation, compelling them to meet all their financial
commitments could end up in a collapse of their
economies, despite all their good-faith efforts.
1995 has been proclaimed World Year of Peoples’
Commemoration of the Victims of the Second World War
and Member States have been called upon solemnly to
commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the
Second World War. This year we will also consider and
assess mid-way the Declaration of the 1990s as the Third
Disarmament Decade.
How can we commemorate the victims of the
Second World War today without also giving thought to
the victims of the wars in the former Yugoslavia, Liberia,
Somalia, Rwanda, Burundi and elsewhere? When will we
commemorate the victims of those wars? There is no
destruction of human life that is more appropriate than
any other. The United Nations was supposed to save
succeeding generations from the scourge of war — but
which war, what kind of war? True, the kind of war
fought from 1939 to 1945 has not recurred, but can we
9

assert today that mankind has mastered the arts of peace?
It is in men’s minds that the instinct for war must be
replaced by the spirit of peace if the world is to be saved
from the scourge of war. If it is not, any progress we have
made will remain fragile.
The United Nations offers us the opportunity to
consider from a global perspective the questions of war,
peace and security. It remains an essential instrument for
achieving the objectives of arms control and disarmament.
But situations of conflict and tension must be prevented
more effectively. An efficient system of collective security
that allows States to reduce their military capacities must be
put in place. It is no longer enough to limit arms and
promote disarmament by regulating weaponry and
establishing the balance of power at lower levels. We feel
that that is not the way to achieve the goal of development
for all, which is the new major challenge facing the United
Nations.
We must reinvent trust in international relations. We
must make a new creative effort to ensure that disarmament
goes hand-in-hand with the achievement of peace, security
and development throughout the world. In this context, we
believe that the Convention on the Prohibition of the
Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical
Weapons and on Their Destruction — the first global and
truly verifiable disarmament treaty — offers a worthwhile
avenue. Indeed, it carries a security gain for all States
through the total elimination of an entire category of
weapons of mass destruction. We hope that this Convention
will soon have the required number of ratifications to enter
into force and thus become a standard shared by all States.
Since the inclusion in the General Assembly’s agenda,
in 1973, of the item on the restitution of works of art to
countries victims of expropriation, we have noted with
satisfaction the continued and growing interest in this item
shown by Members of the United Nations. In addition to
bilateral negotiations for the restitution of cultural property,
we now have the Convention on the Means of Prohibiting
and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of
Ownership of Cultural Property, to which the number of
States Parties continues to grow.
However, the quantity and quality of the cultural
property “returned” or restored are insignificant compared
to the importance which the General Assembly attaches to
the item. Promises made to Zaire by countries which still
hold works of art and other cultural treasures belonging to
Zaire, as well as museum pieces and archives that are
essential to preserving and nourishing cultural values,
have not been fully kept.
We call on the Secretary-General, in cooperation
with the Director-General of the United Nations
Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, to do
everything possible to encourage those countries to
honour their obligations so that the objectives of the
United Nations and the countries of origin can be met.
I wish the General Assembly every success to the
work of its fiftieth session and I wish the United Nations
a long life.


Mr. President, may I
congratulate you on your election and express my deep
satisfaction at seeing a representative of Portugal, an ally
and a valued member of the international community,
occupy the presidency of the General Assembly in our
fiftieth anniversary year.
Anniversaries are occasions to celebrate past
accomplishments. The towering achievement of the United
Nations is to have survived through nearly half a century
where power relationships often submerged the high-minded
vision of the United Nations Charter. Therefore, as we
celebrate the half-century of our Organization, we also
celebrate the triumph of hope over despair and of good
faith over cynicism. At long last, there is an opportunity
for the United Nations to come into its own and for the
ideals of the Charter to take hold.
At the same time, we must learn from our mistakes.
Foremost, in that context, is the tragic conflict in Bosnia
and Herzegovina. In spite of the laudable humanitarian
and peace-keeping efforts of the United Nations, the
Organization has in the eyes of the world appeared
incapable of preventing the savage dismembering of a
sovereign Member State.
Although we all realize that the United Nations can
never provide foolproof insurance against evil and
injustice, the Organization must in the future face such
challenges in a more resolute manner. We must demand
more of ourselves and learn how to use more effectively
the indispensable machinery the Organization has to offer.
We should also bear in mind that no organization,
however efficient, can provide a substitute for the political
will of its Member States.
Recent setbacks should, however, not be allowed to
obscure the considerable gains, global and regional, that
have been made on a number of fronts over the past year.
Let me mention only a few.
The march of democracy has continued through the
organization of free elections in different parts of the
world, and a growing number of people now live under
pluralistic and democratic Governments. In recent years,
the Organization has contributed to the success of
elections in various Member States.
Two major United Nations Conferences took place
earlier this year. Each could, if followed up in earnest,
make a tangible difference in the lives of people
everywhere. At the World Summit on Social
Development in Copenhagen in March, we decided to
place people at the centre of development and to address
the problem of global poverty more effectively. At the
recently concluded Fourth World Conference on Women
in Beijing, we pledged to empower women and to involve
them as equal partners in all spheres of society. Together,
women and men can and should create a powerful unity
based on equality, development and peace.
In the area of international law, the achievements of
the United Nations were once again brought into focus
with the entry into force of the United Nations
Convention on the Law of the Sea last November and the
adoption in August of the Agreement on the
16

Implementation of the Provisions of the Convention relating
to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish
Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks.
In May, a historic step was taken towards ridding the
world of the threat of nuclear weapons. The decision by the
Parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to extend
the Treaty indefinitely and without conditions should pave
the way for a comprehensive and verifiable test ban and an
agreement to cut off the production of fissile material. It is
regrettable that China and France have not heeded the
worldwide demand for a moratorium on nuclear testing.
At the regional level there have also been welcome
developments. While the passage has not been smooth,
there has been further progress towards a comprehensive
peace in the Middle East. We have witnessed the joint
efforts of the Israelis and the Palestinians to bring their
conflict to an end, and we extend to them our sincere
congratulations on their historic agreement to be signed
later this week.
These are substantial accomplishments. They confirm
that hard work, guided by the goals and ideals of the
United Nations, can bear fruit. More of that same
dedication is now required as the Organization prepares to
take on the complex challenges of the twenty-first century.
The foremost challenge is the need to establish and
safeguard peace. While the threat of nuclear holocaust has
receded, we still live in a world riven by wars. Annual
military expenditure still nearly equals the total income of
the poorer half of the world’s population. The peace
dividend we had hoped for in the aftermath of the cold war
remains for many a sight unseen.
The Secretary-General has rightly observed that there
is an inherent link between peace and development.
Without the one you cannot have the other. Peace is the
necessary precondition for the well-being of all peoples,
and in the long run we shall be able to protect ourselves
from the scourge of war only if we make the necessary
investment in the infrastructure of peace. This involves,
among other things, dealing with the legacy of deprivation
that still confronts mankind.
The challenge of development will not lend itself to a
simple formulation in terms of government versus the
market-place. Instead, we must apply a comprehensive
framework, linking democracy, society, the economy and
the environment, carefully nuanced to regional and local
circumstances. Here, the Secretary-General has led the way
in his ground-breaking report. Let me dwell on a few
aspects of the issue of development that are of particular
interest to my own country.
First a word on the role of democracy. Democracies,
it is sometimes said, do not make wars. By promoting
democracy we also foster peace. This is in part because
two of the main pillars of democracy are tolerance and
respect for the customs, traditions and opinions of others.
But tolerance and respect for diversity must not be
misinterpreted. We live in a world of rich cultural
diversity, which we should relish and protect. However,
multiculturalism should never be used as a pretext for
compromising basic and universal human rights.
Iceland attaches continued importance to
international efforts to create a global environment
conducive to job-led economic growth. But economic
growth must never be our sole objective, without regard
to human values.
Environmental protection is another main concern.
Important strides have been made in this area since the
Earth Summit in Rio. Climate change and ozone
depletion, two major dangers to the global ecosystem, are
now being dealt with on the basis of legally binding
conventions. But much will depend on coordinated action
to implement the commitments we have undertaken.
Furthermore, greater attention needs to be devoted to the
marine environment.
Pollution of the marine environment, if not
contained, can have a serious impact on human
settlements in certain regions of the world, not least
communities of indigenous peoples. In this connection,
chemical pollutants in the form of persistent organic
substances are of particular concern for entire societies
which base their livelihood on the living resources of the
sea.
Iceland is firmly of the view that this threat can be
countered only through a global and legally binding
framework similar to that governing climate change and
ozone depletion. For this reason, my Government attaches
particular importance to the conference on the protection
of the marine environment from land-based sources, due
to take place in Washington later this year, and we urge
Member States to take active part in this conference.
Marine living resources can make an important
contribution to food security in a world faced with rapid
population growth. Such resources provide food and
17

livelihood to millions of people and, if sustainably used,
offer increased potential to meet nutritional and social
needs, particularly in the developing countries, as noted in
a recent report of the Food and Agriculture Organization.
For this reason, it is particularly regrettable that close
to 70 per cent of the world’s conventional species of fish
were, according to the same agency, fully exploited,
overexploited or depleted, or are in the process of
rebuilding as a result of depletion in the early 1990s.
Clearly, the ability to satisfy global demand for food from
the sea in the coming years will depend to no small extent
on the adoption of responsible fisheries conservation and
management policies. We should at all times view the
ecosystem of the oceans as a whole and harvest all species
of this vast but delicate resource in a sustainable manner.
Looked at in this light, the results of the United
Nations Conference on Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly
Migratory Fish Stocks, while by no means the final word
on this matter, acquire major significance. Let me point out
that the law of the sea has been the sphere in which Iceland
has been most engaged, beginning in 1949, when, upon a
proposal by Iceland, the International Law Commission was
given the task of studying all aspects of the law of the sea.
Iceland will continue to be active in the implementation of
the Convention on the Law of the Sea.
We live in an era of growing demand on diminishing
natural resources. It is therefore to be welcomed that
international cooperation is now gradually extending to the
Arctic region, breaking at last through the barrier of what
the Icelandic- American explorer Vilhjálmur Stefánsson
once referred to as
“the ancient inherited opinions about the terrors of the
Frozen North”, a “lifeless waste of eternal silence”.
The resources of the Arctic are enormous. The nations of
the region should develop its potential and work together in
the economic, environmental and cultural fields. Therefore,
my Government attaches the highest importance to the
consultations that have taken place among the Governments
of the eight Arctic States to establish the Arctic Council.
We have had intensive discussions on changes in the
Security Council, including on whether to increase its
membership. Iceland is of the view that the fundamental
objective of an enlargement of the Council should be to
strengthen its capacity to discharge the duties assigned to it.
We believe that there should be an increase in the number
of both permanent and non-permanent members. In this
context, I would like to express my Government’s support
for the permanent membership of Germany and Japan in
the Security Council.
Reform, however, will avail us little if we fail to
come to grips with the serious financial situation of the
United Nations. Here, I fully share the deep concerns that
the Secretary-General has expressed in his comprehensive
report on the state of the Organization. According to their
obligations under the Charter, the Member States should
pay their contributions to the regular budget in full, on
time and without condition. If all Member States do not
live up to their obligations, we will be forced to take the
inevitable political decision to scale back the activities of
the Organization. At a time when the services of the
United Nations are in greater demand and when the
Organization has a better chance of success than ever
before, such a step would be highly unfortunate. Instead,
let us put the fiftieth anniversary to good use and make
the earnest pledge to put the Organization on a sound
financial footing.


May I extend our
congratulations to you, Sir, upon your election as President
of the General Assembly at this historic fiftieth session. The
delegation of Hungary stands ready to do its fair share in
assisting you in the fulfilment of your important
responsibilities.
The 50-year-old United Nations is a living witness to
our successes and failures. In many quarters, the question
is raised whether the United Nations has a credibility
problem at this important juncture of its history. We have
to remind ourselves that the capacity of the United Nations
to act is nothing but the reflection of the will and
determination of its Member States. With the euphoria over
the end of the cold war gone, we ought to take a hard look
at the role the United Nations is called upon to play in a
dramatically altered, often fluid international environment
where shared values may not automatically yield
converging interests.
The Charter provides us with valuable guidance for
distinguishing sound international order and stability from
the expedience of appeasement. The question is whether the
international community is always ready to act accordingly
by taking a firm stand against aggression, heinous crimes
against humanity and flagrant infringements on the human
rights and fundamental freedoms of millions of individuals
around the globe.
We believe that there can be no place for complacency
when we witness devastating wars, lawlessness, the
suffering of civilian populations and widespread human
misery. There is no positive answer to the question
whether, in spite of the absence of the threat of a new
world catastrophe, we can keep our planet safe and secure.
A fundamentally changed global political environment, as
bipolarism fades away, cannot prevent the outbreak of local
wars, internal conflicts or ethnic strife. The values and
principles we hold so dear seem to be distant dreams
against the backdrop of horrors occurring in places remote
for some, but dangerously close to others.

We have come to realize the growing importance of
effective regional tools in addressing this new type of
mostly internal conflicts, where the rule of law and
accountable national administrations are often non-
existent, where warlords and other unscrupulous leaders
lead campaigns of intimidation, “ethnic cleansing” and
genocide in an atmosphere of nationalism and hatred.
Throughout the years, the United Nations has achieved a
number of important successes by brokering peace
agreements, conducting peace-keeping operations,
improving humanitarian situations and promoting national
reconciliation.
The world Organization is better equipped to deal
with traditional conflict situations. However, it has yet to
prepare itself for meeting all the new and alarming
challenges. While the United Nations cannot realistically
manage all the crises occurring world wide, because of its
unique role and responsibility in the maintenance of
international peace and security, it should seek to
strengthen global political consensus on the principles of
the Charter, assist, through its preventive capacity, in the
formulation of regional strategies and efforts and take
decisive action when regional or global security is
seriously challenged.
Today’s conflicts call for a more coherent yet
decentralized United Nations response capability.
Streamlining and rationalizing the Organization should be
the order of the day, not only to eliminate waste and
overlap, but also to make the best use of existing political
and financial resources. We also fully support the
Secretary-General’s efforts to improve coordination
between United Nations organs and agencies with a view
to enhancing the early-warning, stand-by and rapid-
reaction capacities of the Organization, which should
focus on all the political, security, social, economic-
ecological, humanitarian and human rights areas of United
Nations activity.
As regards the reform efforts in general, one should
bear in mind that agreement on such diverse issues as the
elimination of the enemy-States clause from the Charter
or the reform of the financing of peace-keeping operations
cannot be achieved overnight. We hope that the
9

establishment of an open-ended working group of the
General Assembly, chaired by its President, will be an
important milestone in this highly complex endeavour. We
welcome the important measures already implemented and
are looking forward to others which are designed to
enhance the transparency and effectiveness of the
functioning of the Security Council.
The main mission of the United Nations is to make the
world a safer place for all. After a series of United Nations
conferences on the most important global problems, such as
environment, human rights, population and social
development, and the recently concluded World Conference
on Women, we ought to focus our attention on the practical
implementation of their recommendations.
Earlier this year the international community extended
for an indefinite period the validity of the Treaty on the
Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Hungary had
supported from the very beginning the idea of indefinite
extension, for we are convinced that this major international
instrument promotes stability by preventing the spread of
the nuclear arsenal and at the same time aims at the orderly
development of nuclear cooperation for peaceful purposes.
We hope that the security guarantees given to the
non-nuclear States by the permanent members of the
Security Council, as well as the prospects of a thorough
review of the operation of the Treaty — including the
obligations in the field of nuclear disarmament, especially
the early conclusion of a comprehensive test-ban treaty —
will open up further possibilities for progress in this area.
The tragedy in the former Yugoslavia has revealed,
not only where brutality and the trampling of elementary
norms of international law and human behaviour can lead,
but also the devastating consequences of unwillingness to
enforce the legitimate decisions of the international
community. What we have seen was that the Security
Council, and consequently the United Nations as a whole,
was either unable or unwilling to follow through its own
resolutions, thus leaving the initiative to those whose only
argument was and is naked force and the policy of the fait
accompli. The crisis in the Balkans is a serious and tragic
reminder that the Security Council can preserve its
authority and credibility only if there is a unity of action
which ensures the full and timely implementation of its
resolutions. Another important lesson to be drawn from the
handling of this crisis is that adequate early-warning and
preventive machineries should be put in place to forestall
the eruption of further tragedies and conflicts.
The Republic of Hungary, being a neighbouring
country to three of the new States that emerged on the
territory of the former Yugoslavia, is vitally interested in
peaceful and good-neighbourly cooperation with all of
them and in the early settlement of the conflict by
political means, on the basis of the purposes and
principles of the Charter, international law and the
resolutions of the Security Council. In our view, a visible
and credible international presence, backed up by
international resolve to guarantee the implementation of
decisions taken, is essential for this purpose. We believe
that no comprehensive and lasting arrangements can be
worked out for this conflict if two, so far quite neglected,
factors are not taken fully into account.
First, any solution should incorporate the human
rights dimension, including effective guarantees for
minority rights in accordance with international standards.
In this regard, I would like to pay tribute to the former
Special Rapporteur for the Commission on Human Rights,
Mr. Tadeusz Mazowiecki, for his untiring efforts
consistently to uphold the values of our civilization.
Neither massive economic assistance, nor a huge
international presence can make a real difference if the
human rights questions are left unaddressed.
Secondly, the security of the subregion, and, indeed,
of Europe as a whole, is threatened by massive arms
stockpiles, mostly left over from the previous period,
when the former Yugoslavia — not being a party to the
Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) —
maintained significant armed forces, in fact, one of the
relatively largest in Europe. It is of vital importance,
therefore, to work out, in the context of the settlement,
arrangements to reduce conventional armaments on the
territory of former Yugoslavia.
The acquisition of territory by force and the
accompanying abhorrent phenomenon of “ethnic
cleansing” in the former Yugoslavia led to the destruction
of entire regions. It triggered a forced population
movement unseen in Europe since the Second World
War. Today, when we are about to enter the fifth year of
the war and the diplomatic efforts to find a solution are
continuing, we should not lose sight of political
responsibilities and personal accountabilities for the
initiation of this drama. The sick ideas of ethnically pure,
homogenous, single-nation States had started a vicious
cycle of vengeance that claimed the lives of over 100,000
people and forced millions of others to flee, many of
them seeking refuge in neighbouring and other countries.
In this regard, the settlement of refugees in new areas
10

traditionally inhabited by other national minorities in order
to change their century-old ethnic composition is contrary
to international law. It is even more so if it is being
conducted by forcible means and through intimidation, as
has happened to the Croat and Hungarian minorities in the
Vojvodina province of Serbia.
The Government of Hungary has, on several
occasions, expressed its grave concern about the negative
impact of the conflict on the ethnic composition of the
population concerned. From this rostrum, I should like to
call the attention of the international community again to
the need to elaborate a comprehensive settlement, in the
framework of which the question of the refugees should be
so resolved as to respect the interests of each and every
ethnic community. Any settlement must include the
development and implementation of agreements that ensure
the survival of these communities, respect their human
rights and fundamental freedoms, including minority rights,
and encourage the establishment of institutions that
guarantee those rights in the long run.
The issue of human rights and fundamental freedoms
remains in the forefront of our attention. Protection and
promotion of these rights is not only a voluntarily
undertaken obligation of all Members of the United
Nations, but a responsibility the implementation of which
can be legitimately scrutinized by the international
community. In Vienna, we closed the debate on the
universality of human rights by adopting the document of
the World Conference on Human Rights and restating
universality in its own right as our guiding principle since
the proclamation of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights. The legitimate role of the United Nations acting in
defence of human rights should therefore be supported and
strengthened.
With renewed waves of human rights violations
occurring worldwide, mostly in internal conflicts or ethnic
strife, our Organization has to step up its early-warning and
preventive capacities, develop an integrated response
mechanism encompassing field visits and monitors, a closer
integration of the human rights element in peace-keeping
activities and ensuring effective interaction in the
implementation of political, peace-keeping, human rights
and humanitarian mandates. International presence,
particularly preventive protection, is a most efficient
deterrent in curbing violations and preventing their
escalation.
The establishment of the Office of the United Nations
High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR) was built
on the premise of giving more coherence and visibility to
human rights activities within the United Nations system.
However, our commitment to human rights rings hollow
without constant efforts to improve the efficiency of the
United Nations human rights machinery, focusing on
prevention, on-site monitoring and developing a rapid-
response capacity.
May I now address the General Assembly in my
capacity as Chairman-in-Office of the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
The cooperation between the United Nations and the
OSCE has significantly developed on both political and
operational levels since the December 1994 Budapest
summit. As the OSCE, a regional organization in the
sense of Chapter VIII of the Charter, embarks on so-far-
uncharted waters in conflict prevention and crisis
management, the advice and assistance of the United
Nations proves to be an important asset, for which I
would like to express our appreciation to the Secretary-
General.
Based on the agreement concluded between the two
organizations, we have indeed developed flexible forms
of cooperation, not only in the political area, but in our
joint efforts on humanitarian issues, human rights,
sanctions-monitoring and operational presence.
At present, the OSCE has missions in Georgia,
Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Former Yugoslav Republic
of Macedonia, Moldova, Ukraine, Tajikistan, Nagorno-
Karabakh, Estonia, Latvia and Chechnya. We are also
about to establish one in Croatia. We find it indispensable
that the OSCE mission to Kosovo, Sandjak and Vojvodina
in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and
Montenegro) resume its activities, in accordance with the
relevant resolution of the Security Council.
Though the mandates of these OSCE missions vary,
they still point in the same direction, namely assisting the
parties involved in finding a political solution to their
differences on the basis of OSCE principles and
commitments. OSCE helps to monitor and verify cease-
fire accords, supervise troop withdrawals, establish
negotiating structures and principles for talks on national
reconciliation and respect for human rights and
fundamental freedoms. It has to be added that in some
cases the OSCE has to work hard to obtain the necessary
political endorsement of the parties to engage in a
peaceful and structured political process and offer mutual
concessions.
11

I wish to express our appreciation of the peace efforts
in Bosnia and Herzegovina which, in this very city of New
York only two days ago, yielded the so-called “further
agreed basic principles”. As its Chairman-in-Office, I can
see that it is extremely important that the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe may soon find itself in
a new, important and challenging role as an active
participant in the course of the implementation of the long-
awaited Bosnian peace accords.
In making use of the mutually reinforcing capabilities
of the United Nations and the OSCE, the Hungarian
Chairmanship-in-Office of the organization for 1995 is
determined to strengthen both organizations. I remain
convinced that the further development of this cooperation
in the vast area from Alaska to Kamchatka will, with the
active support of Members, bring us closer to the
realization of the noble ideals set forth in the Charter 50
years ago.


Mr. President, my Foreign Minister has asked me
to read out his statement on his behalf.
“Mr. President, it gives me great pleasure to
congratulate you upon your election to the important
post of President of this historic fiftieth session of the
General Assembly. I am confident that, under your
skilful leadership, the General Assembly will write
one more significant page in the chronicles of the
United Nations. I should also like to express my
gratitude to your distinguished predecessor, Mr.
Amara Essy, for his valuable contribution to the work
of the General Assembly at its forty-ninth session.
“I should like to express particular words of
gratitude to the Secretary-General, Mr. Boutros
Boutros-Ghali, for his tireless efforts to strengthen
peace on Earth.
“We have gathered here on this fiftieth
anniversary year of the existence of the United
Nations, understanding as we do the tremendous
significance of the role played by our Organization
in the world today. All progressive people welcomed
the end of the cold war, rightly believing that it
would lead to an easing of nuclear confrontation and
an improvement of the political climate on the
planet. However, the dissolution of totalitarian
systems entailed the emergence of bloody armed
conflicts and hot spots around the world.
“The world has witnessed with tremendous
alarm the continuing military confrontations and
tension in the republics of the former Yugoslavia,
Tajikistan and the Nagorny Karabakh region of
Azerbaijan.
“For seven years now we have seen open
aggression from the Republic of Armenia against the
Azerbaijan Republic. Twenty per cent of Azerbaijan
territory has been under occupation by the armed
forces of the Republic of Armenia. More than one
million Azerbaijanis have been forcibly driven from
their homes. A serious hotbed of tension has been
created in the region and threatens international
peace and security.
“The Security Council has adopted four
resolutions on the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict in
which it called upon the aggressor to withdraw,
immediately and totally, from the occupied
territories. However, the Republic of Armenia has
completely ignored compliance with the resolutions
General Assembly 21st plenary meeting

and as a Member of the United Nations is, in effect,
refusing to follow the decisions of one of its major
organs.
“Almost a year has elapsed since the adoption in
Budapest by the Heads of State and Government,
members of the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), of a decision
appointing the co-chairmen of the Minsk Conference
on the settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijan conflict
designed to ensure the signing of a major political
agreement the realization of which should eliminate all
the consequences of the conflict. However, in this case
the Republic of Armenia is pursuing a policy of
putting forward obviously unacceptable conditions and
attempting to impose provisions which would impose
in advance a political status on the Nagorny Karabakh
region of the Republic of Azerbaijan. Here we are
faced with attempts to intimidate us with the
possibility of the undermining of the peace-keeping
operation in the region. It is, to say the least, unethical
to accuse the victim of aggression, of not being
willing to compromise on the problem of the
liberation of its occupied territories.
“Azerbaijan, for its part, is continuously
displaying its readiness for constructive cooperation
with the mediators in order to bring about a peaceful
settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijan conflict.
“We have repeatedly expressed ourselves in
favour of a multinational peace-keeping operation of
the OSCE for the maintenance of peace on the border
between Azerbaijan and Armenia and in the region as
a whole.
“At the present time discussions are taking place
on the mandate and parameters of the peace-
keeping operations of that Organization. In connection
with the fact that the peace-keeping operation in our
region will be the first to be carried out by the OSCE,
Azerbaijan has agreed to the provision of technical
expert consultative assistance from the United Nations
for the success of this operation.
“Azerbaijan shares the general understanding that
peace-keeping operations should be viewed as
temporary in nature and should be used to promote a
climate to facilitate the settlement of a particular
problem. At the same time, however, we must not lose
sight of the fact that settlement is the ultimate goal. In
implementing any peace-keeping operation we must
strictly abide by the principles contained in the
United Nations Charter, particularly the principles of
respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of
States and non-intervention in internal affairs.
“Peace-keeping operations must be based on an
appropriate mandate drawn up with the consent of
all the parties involved, and they must be impartial,
objective and neutral in character. Azerbaijan agrees
with the current and established international
practice under which the military contingent of any
country participating in a given peace-keeping
operation should not exceed 30 per cent of the total
for the force. It is also important for the
international organs involved in peace-keeping
operations to furnish all available information to
States and to keep world public opinion informed of
the progress of the operation.
“The settlement of the conflict between
Armenia and Azerbaijan entails strict compliance
with these principles. Failing the liberation of all
Azerbaijani territory occupied by Armenia, there can
be no question of any comprehensive settlement of
this conflict. Restoration of the territorial integrity of
the Republic of Azerbaijan and the return of
refugees and displaced persons to their homes in
accordance with international practice are the only
bases on which a solution can be found to the
problem of the Armenian national minority
population in Azerbaijan.
“In the context of a settlement of the
Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict I should also like to
draw attention to the principle of the right of peoples
to self-determination, a principle that the Republic of
Armenia is flouting. The world has not yet found a
workable balance between the principle of the right
of peoples to self-determination, on the one hand,
and the principle of the sovereignty and territorial
integrity of States, on the other. Nevertheless, it is
clear that the right to self-determination, as
contained in the Charter, is not intended to furnish
a pretext for flouting the principle of independence
and territorial integrity.
“The Republic of Azerbaijan, now a full-
fledged member of the world community, has
undertaken to abide by all universally recognized
norms and principles of international law in its
relations with other States. The Republic of
Armenia, however, has persistently attempted to use
2
General Assembly 21st plenary meeting

the principle of the right of peoples to self-
determination as a pretext to legitimize and
consolidate its territorial claims and to justify its
aggression against Azerbaijan and its occupation of
Azerbaijani territory. Indeed, the expansionist circles
in Armenia have been implementing such a policy for
years. In 1988, when the Soviet Union was still in
existence, the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic
expelled its Azerbaijani population — some 200,000
persons, a national minority. Immediately following
that inhuman decision, the Parliament of Armenia,
acting counter to all the norms and principles of
international law, approved Armenia’s annexation of
the Nagorny Karabakh region of Azerbaijan — in
other words, it decided to annex a part of the territory
of a neighbouring State.
“Subsequently, 50,000 persons were expelled
from the Nagorny Karabakh region, whose total
population numbered 170,000, with the financial and
military support of the Republic of Armenia. In
addition, Armenian armed forces were used to
consolidate the annexation of the Lachin and Shusha
districts of Azerbaijan, through which the Republic of
Armenia maintains direct communication with the
Nagorny Karabakh region of the Republic of
Azerbaijan. Through this corridor, cynically referred
to as a humanitarian corridor, a river of weapons,
ammunitions and human resources flows from the
Republic of Armenia. Some 20 per cent of the
territory of Azerbaijan is now occupied by Armenian
armed forces. Again, this armed expansion is
accompanied by a thorough ethnic cleansing' of the
occupied Azerbaijani territories and a scorched-earth
policy.
“The world community must condemn the
actions of Armenia in Azerbaijan and call for the full
and unconditional withdrawal of the Armenian armed
forces from the occupied territories and for the return
of refugees and displaced persons to their homes. This
is clearly a case in which we are witnessing a total
disregard for the provision of the United Nations
Charter that calls upon all Member States
to refrain in their international relations from
the threat or use of force against the territorial
integrity or political independence of any State,
or in any other manner inconsistent with the
Purposes of the United Nations.'
World public opinion must not be misled as to the
true motives for the actions of Armenia, which is
cloaking its aggression against Azerbaijan in the
lofty principle of the right of peoples to self-
determination.
“Armenia’s aggression against Azerbaijan has
caused enormous suffering and grief to the whole of
the Azerbaijani people, who have been forced by the
military actions and occupation of the Armenian
armed forces to leave their homes, abandon their
property and flee in order to avoid falling into the
hands of the occupiers. The Azerbaijani Government
has been forced to convert many schools, dwellings,
sanatoriums and rest homes into housing for
refugees and displaced persons. In the territory of
Azerbaijan, people are forced to take refuge in tent
cities. The normal life of the country has been
almost totally destroyed.
“We are grateful to the countries and
international and non-governmental organizations
that have lent active humanitarian assistance to
Azerbaijan. The United Nations too has played an
important role in this assistance. The activities of the
1995-1996 humanitarian programmes, as presented
in the United Nations consolidated inter-agency
humanitarian assistance appeal for the Caucasus,
include relief projects in the food, non-food, shelter,
education and health sectors. However, as the
Secretary-General indicates in his annual report on
the work of the Organization, only 37 per cent, or
$12.8 million, of the requirements pledged for
humanitarian activities in Azerbaijan had been
received as at 31 July 1995. Other projects carried
out under the aegis of the United Nations have
addressed capacity-building and the transition from
emergency assistance to development.
“Azerbaijan has always attached great
importance to multifaceted cooperation with the
United Nations system in the spheres of social and
economic development. Following the dissolution of
the USSR our country was confronted with the task
of radically restructuring the Azerbaijani economy
on a free-market basis. No country can be expected
to undertake such a radical restructuring unilaterally
without the active cooperation of international
organizations, and Azerbaijan has been no exception.
So far, we can point with some satisfaction to the
continued cooperation between the Government of
Azerbaijan and such important international financial
3
General Assembly 21st plenary meeting

institutions as the International Monetary Fund and the
International Bank for Reconstruction and
Development. We have had considerable success in
stabilizing the exchange rate of the manat, our national
currency. The Government of Azerbaijan has received
approval of sizeable loans to assist in a number of
major infrastructure projects and for drilling and
transporting oil.
“Although the majority of the contacts between
Azerbaijan and the United Nations system have been
successful, we must nevertheless mention some
current problems. We have not yet been able to
resolve the question of a proper scale for Azerbaijan’s
contribution to the regular budget of the Organization
that would reflect my country’s real ability to pay.
“In Azerbaijan’s brief period of independence
some important changes have occurred. The Republic
of Azerbaijan has begun to build its free democratic
society on the basis of a market economy. We shall
continue to pursue that path. It goes without saying,
however, that the transition from one social and
economic system to another requires a certain amount
of time and very careful and meticulous work.
“We need fundamental changes in many aspects
of the life of the Republic, and corresponding changes
in the thinking of our people. After long stagnation,
the people have achieved civic freedom; now, they
must understand that freedom. This is one of our most
important areas of activity. A certain amount of
progress has been made with respect to the political
life of Azerbaijan. The principles of political
pluralism, personal freedoms and freedom of
expression, of the press and of conscience are
guaranteed. Human rights are effectively protected. A
multi-party system is at work. We consistently act on
the principle of the primacy of law. Irrespective of sex
or national, religious, ethnic or linguistic affiliation,
citizens of Azerbaijan enjoy equal rights.
“Azerbaijan’s highest legislative body, the Milli
Majlis, has adopted a new electoral law, which is a
milestone in the development of a democratic society
in our country. This law is a further example of how
Azerbaijan is proceeding with the building of a
democratic civil society. Parliamentary elections in
Azerbaijan are scheduled for 12 November this year;
this confirms our unswerving policy of strengthening
independence and sovereignty. Many countries and
major international organizations, including the United
Nations, the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe and others, have already
agreed to act as observers of the elections. I take
this opportunity to invite States Members of the
United Nations to send observers to the elections in
Azerbaijan.
“In the social and economic sphere, our
purposeful reforms in the political area and towards
a democratic society have made it possible to create
the preconditions for economic and social change,
which is proceeding with success in our country and
which is laying the foundation for an early transition
to market relationships. The Republic has achieved
a certain stabilization of macro-economic indicators
and is doing all it can to encourage the development
of free enterprise. We have begun a conscientious
programme of privatization. Inflation, which had in
previous years reached 30 to 35 per cent per month,
has now been reduced to near zero. We appeal to
the international community and to foreign
businesses to increase their investment in the
economy of Azerbaijan. We have created all the
proper conditions for profitable activities by foreign
companies. International consortiums are stepping up
their activities; in addition to the Azerbaijan State oil
company, these include major transnational
corporations. These activities are aimed at joint
exploration and development of oil and gas deposits
in the Azerbaijan sector of the Caspian Sea.
“The 50 years of the United Nations have
shown that the peoples of the world can achieve a
great deal when they combine their efforts and their
will to defend world peace and to achieve the
prosperity of peoples. We know that it was concern
with preventing another world war that ordained the
foundation of the United Nations, and this remains
the main task before mankind today. For war annuls
all that the efforts of peoples have achieved.”


I should like to begin by
congratulating you, Sir, on your election to the presidency
of the General Assembly at its fiftieth session. At the
same time, I wish to thank your predecessor,
His Excellency Mr. Amara Essy.
We are meeting this year at a crucial moment in the
history of the United Nations. The fiftieth anniversary of
the Organization should be an occasion on which to
review the first half-century of the United Nations, but
also, first and foremost, to prepare the Organization for its
future activities and to address the manifold challenges
that are ahead of us.
While we commemorate the United Nations fiftieth
anniversary, Liechtenstein is celebrating its fifth year of
membership in the Organization. When Liechtenstein was
admitted to the United Nations, the global situation was
undergoing fundamental changes. People around the world
hoped that the Organization would be able to work in a
comprehensive and more efficient way towards fulfilling
the purposes assigned to it under the Charter. Many of
these hopes have remained unfulfilled. The optimism that
prevailed at the beginning of the post-cold-war era has
turned into sometimes heavy criticism and a decreasing
confidence in the work of the United Nations. This
criticism is not always justified and is sometimes based
on a lack of understanding of the functioning of the
United Nations or, more often, on a one-sided approach
to its activities.
The achievements of the Organization in the areas of
development, humanitarian assistance, the promotion and
protection of human rights and the strengthening and
further development of international law, to name only a
few, are unique and undeniable. However, it remains a
fact that events of the recent past have undermined the
credibility of the United Nations in the eyes of many
people, and we have to make every effort to restore and
enhance the confidence of the peoples that we represent.
We must only look back in order to make the best use of
the experience we have acquired over the past 50 years
and to enable the Organization to respond effectively to
the new challenges it faces today.
The financial situation of the Organization is beyond
any doubt one of the issues that need to be addressed
urgently. After many years of serious financial problems,
we have reached a stage where the work of the United
Nations itself is in jeopardy. Drastic measures had to be
taken recently to guarantee the continuation of its daily
work. It is of the utmost importance, however, that no
9
General Assembly 22nd plenary meeting
Fiftieth session 13 October 1995
measures be taken which affect the nature and the
efficiency of United Nations activities, which are urgently
needed. The efforts to improve and to monitor the
administrative and management capabilities must be
continued and further enhanced. All Member States have to
pay their assessed contributions fully and on time if a
durable solution to the current crisis is to be found. We are
confident that the Working Group that you, Mr. President,
will be chairing, will produce fruitful results.
The increasing financial burden that peace-keeping
operations impose on national budgets must be alleviated.
We are of the opinion that a proliferation of peace-keeping
operations has to be avoided, and I wish to emphasize that
the concept of preventive diplomacy deserves even more
attention than it has received until now.
It is obvious that the world has changed. It is also
obvious that the challenges for the United Nations have
changed. For these reasons, changes have to be made
within the Organization in order to enable it to cope with
these challenges. We therefore support the efforts to reform,
modernize and restructure the United Nations and welcome
the process that has been initiated to that effect.
Many people wrongly identify the United Nations only
with the activities of and the decisions taken by the
Security Council. While we must work together in order to
promote understanding and knowledge of other United
Nations activities, which are equally important, we also
have to understand that issues of international peace and
security directly or emotionally affect people all over the
world. We therefore have to make every effort to enhance
the effectiveness and the credibility of the work of the
Council. A limited expansion of the permanent and non-
permanent membership and improved working methods, as
well as enhanced transparency, would certainly make an
important contribution in this respect. As a small country,
we follow the activities of the pertinent Working Group
with particular interest. We are of the view that the work
done so far has been very substantial. However, many of
the sensitive questions require further discussions.
Liechtenstein, like many other countries, has to rely on
the universal respect for international law. The United
Nations has made remarkable contributions to the further
development and strengthening of international law. The
adoption of new legal instruments in important areas,
however, sharply conflicts with continued and sometimes
systematic violations of international law, particularly in the
field of human rights, and of international humanitarian
law. The establishment of the international ad hoc Tribunals
for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda can prove to be an
important element in preventing the recurrence of such
violations. It is essential that, for the first time since the
Tribunals of Nuremberg and of Tokyo, individuals be
held responsible for violations of international
humanitarian law. We hope that the work of these
Tribunals will be effective and will contribute to the early
establishment of a permanent international criminal court.
The Liechtenstein Government welcomes the historic
decision to make the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons (NPT) permanent. We have come one
step closer to the overall elimination of nuclear weapons,
and we express our most fervent hope that the NPT will
very soon become universal. We therefore appeal to those
States which have not yet ratified the Treaty to do so
urgently. We further express our hope that the next step
will be the early conclusion of a comprehensive nuclear
test-ban treaty. Liechtenstein deplores the fact that nuclear
tests are still going on and urges all nuclear-weapon
States to refrain from any further testing.
One of the most remarkable and uncontested merits
of the United Nations in its first 50 years lies in the field
of self-determination. While some people seem to think
that these activities of the Organization are a closed
chapter that belongs to the past, others, including the
Government of Liechtenstein, are of the view that the
potential of the right to self-determination has not been
exhausted and offers possibilities to cope with many
conflict situations all over the world. We are convinced
that the right to self-determination deserves further
discussion and development within the United Nations.
Liechtenstein has therefore, within the framework of its
national activities for the commemoration of the fiftieth
anniversary, organized two international conferences this
year dedicated to this subject. We hope that we can
continue to count on the Organization’s interest in this
matter, which is of crucial importance for the fulfilment
of its purposes.
The Fourth World Conference on Women, which
concluded in Beijing three weeks ago, reaffirmed that the
human rights of women and of the girl child are an
integral part of universal human rights. The Liechtenstein
Government welcomes the fact that the Conference agreed
on a wide range of measures to remove the remaining
obstacles to women’s full and equal participation in all
spheres of life. The Beijing Declaration and Platform for
Action contain a comprehensive plan for the international
community to promote the status of women, to the
ultimate benefit of society as a whole. It gives me
10
General Assembly 22nd plenary meeting
Fiftieth session 13 October 1995
pleasure to announce that the Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
has recently been submitted to the Liechtenstein Parliament
for approval.
The fiftieth anniversary cannot be an occasion for self-
congratulation. However impressive the achievements,
however disappointing the failures, one thing is certain:
there is no alternative to the United Nations, and all
Member States have to work together to make the
Organization stronger and more efficient. The Government
of Liechtenstein remains committed to this goal.