 Please allow me to
congratulate you, Sir, and Côte d’Ivoire on your election to
the presidency of the General Assembly at its forty-ninth
session. Our deliberations under your presidency are
certain to be a success. May I also take this occasion to
thank His Excellency Ambassador Samuel Insanally, the
Permanent Representative of the Republic of Guyana, for
his many contributions as President of the General
Assembly at its forty-eighth session.
The economic and political changes currently under
way have raised the hopes of all of us for a better future.
Democracy has been restored to much of the world, thus
not only showing that it is the most suitable model of
government, but also making possible a greater degree of
international cooperation, strengthening the rule of
international law and giving the United Nations a more
powerful role.
In Eastern Europe, the process of democratic change
is now irreversible. Though much is made of the dangers
of new ethnic conflicts and the rise of new
ultra-nationalistic and totalitarian forces, they become ever
less likely to succeed with each day that passes. Have we
not seen two of the most apparently intractable problems -
the Middle East and South Africa - brought to a peaceful
conclusion? The Middle East was a crucible of conflict;
apartheid in South Africa was a disgrace to the entire
human race. Mr. de Klerk and Mr. Mandela showed both
political wisdom and human tolerance in agreeing on a
transition for the Republic of South Africa. South Africa
will play a major role in future developments in the
African continent.
Those are just some causes for optimism. But
optimism does not mean expecting that all our crises will
simply resolve themselves without any action on our part.
If our collective hopes and desires are to lead anywhere,
then the work must begin here at the United Nations,
where representatives from the entire world are gathered.
The time has come when we can make this world a better
place to live.
Never in the history of the world has the awareness
of the global nature of the basic issues been as strong as
it is today. Never has the desire for cooperation between
nations so clearly superseded the wish for the domination
of one nation by another. And never has man had so
much knowledge and technology at his fingertips as he
has today. All of these factors are predispositions for a
greater role for the United Nations, and we must do
everything to ensure that the mechanisms of the United
Nations work more effectively.
We support the efforts for the reconstruction of the
Security Council. The Security Council ought to enhance
both its effectiveness and its efficiency, as well as its
representational capacity. A measured, realistic expansion
of the composition of the Council would be appropriate.
Furthermore, Slovenia supports the proposal that Germany
and Japan become permanent members of the Council.
An additional task in this regard relates to the need
to enhance the transparency of the work of the Security
11

Council. The system of consultations should be developed
further, so as to provide an adequate opportunity for the
participation of United Nations Member States interested in
various situations dealt with by the Security Council.
The General Assembly could also make a greater
contribution to the development of adequate approaches on
the part of the Security Council, as well as to less costly
and more effective methods of preventive diplomacy, and
at the same time decrease the need for the Security Council
to intervene in armed conflicts.
Furthermore, in recent years the General Assembly has
taken an important step in this direction through the
establishment of the post of High Commissioner for Human
Rights.
Last, but not least, it is important to do as much as
possible to strengthen the United Nations financially, even
though the finance ministers in each and every Member
country find that their contributions to the United Nations
are a significant component of their State budget. Slovenia
is committed to the principle that contributions to the
United Nations must be paid in full and on time. The
regular payment of contributions is an essential part of all
efforts aimed at the financial reform of the United Nations.
The Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and the recent
Conference on Population and Development have brought
this Organization into the public consciousness in a new
way; they have shown that we are conscious of some of the
most fundamental problems that face all of us, not just
Governments, but the people. Though some may be
sceptical about the results of these Conferences, my feeling
is that they have contributed significantly towards a global
consensus and have involved a whole new constituency in
our work.
The maintenance of international peace and security is
enshrined in the United Nations Charter as the main
purpose of the Organization. I believe that one of the most
important questions to be dealt with is dealing with the
provision of armed forces acting within the framework of
United Nations operations. The variety and complexity of
United Nations military and related activities have
developed far beyond what was once defined as
"peace-keeping". Careful reflection is needed on future
directions to be taken. Slovenia welcomes the Secretary-
General’s current efforts to develop a system of stand-by
forces and is ready to participate in these efforts.
The maintenance of international peace and security
must be strengthened by effective measures in the field of
disarmament. Slovenia is, like most other States Parties
to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear
Weapons, convinced of the need for indefinite extension
of that Treaty. Furthermore we are convinced of the need
for enhanced security guarantees, in particular negative
security guarantees. We also support the efforts to
achieve a comprehensive ban on nuclear testing and other
disarmament measures with respect to weapons of mass
destruction. With respect to conventional weapons, we
support the United States initiative for the conclusion of
an agreement to reduce the number and availability of
anti-personnel land-mines. In short, the issues of
disarmament ought to remain high among the priorities of
the United Nations agenda.
The protection of human rights and fundamental
freedoms is another of the highest priorities of the United
Nations. For the Republic of Slovenia, it represents both
a basic domestic task and a strong international
commitment. Slovenia actively participated in the World
Conference on Human Rights, held in Vienna in 1993,
and in the subsequent efforts leading to the appointment
of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights.
By the same token, we support the efforts for further
development of the United Nations system in the field of
human rights. We are ready to contribute to the work of
the Working Group of the Third Committee in its search
for the appropriate methods of protection of human rights.
Here again we believe that prevention is better than cure,
and that appropriate international action is necessary in
order to prevent situations characterized by violations of
human rights.
The United Nations is confronted with a variety of
situations involving the use of force. The armed conflicts
in the Balkans are among the most difficult situations.
Slovenia is the only successor State of the
now-disintegrated former Yugoslavia which is not directly
threatened by the ongoing conflict in that region. None
the less, Slovenia remains vitally interested in the stability
of the Balkans. The horrors of war against ordinary
citizens, mass violations of human rights and breaches of
the United Nations Charter first in the Republic of Croatia
and now in the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina
cause serious concern to the entire international
community.
I will not be telling Members anything new when I
say that the international community was not prepared for
12

the eruption of the crisis that occurred within the territory
of the former Yugoslavia. Unfortunately, the conflict that
was subsequently to occur within Bosnia and Herzegovina
has seriously damaged the image and credibility of the
United Nations. It is true that without the involvement of
the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) and the
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR), working in conjunction with many
humanitarian organizations, the tragedy in Bosnia would
have been even worse. But humanitarian assistance alone
cannot be considered as a substitute for effective policy.
Such achievements as the Washington Agreement,
concluded between the Bosnian Muslims and Croats, do at
least raise some hope that appropriate international
assistance can meaningfully influence the political aspects
of the conflict. Nevertheless, the continuation of the
militant behaviour by the Bosnian Serbs maintains the need
for the option of lifting of the arms embargo against the
legitimate Government of the Republic of Bosnia and
Herzegovina to remain on the agenda. This war, with all
its consequences, is threatening to continue into a third
winter, and I am afraid that this certainly most risky and
negative of options will be the only one left if the
international community does not prove able to bring about
an end to hostilities and open the way towards a viable
peace with the necessary elements of justice.
I would like to end this sad chapter of my address
with a warning. We should by no means forget that the
terrifying pattern of "ethnic cleansing" has been patented in
the conflicts that have occurred across the territories of
several successor States of the former Yugoslavia.
Regardless of the final outcome of these conflicts in the
Balkans, we must seriously consider all the means and
methods at our disposal that may prevent a repetition of
this pattern of events occurring in other parts of the world.
I speak for a country which has the good fortune not
to be a problem, but a country which seeks solutions. In
the less than two years in which our independence was
internationally recognized, we have, under difficult
circumstances, achieved positive economic growth. We
have managed to maintain a high level of social security
and stability. The transformation and reform of our
economy has gone hand-in-hand with the rapid growth of
our democratic institutions. We are paying special attention
to the protection of human rights and of our ethnic
minorities. Slovenia is a member of the Council of Europe;
we have signed the Partnership for Peace and the Pact of
Stability; Slovenia is a factor of stability in Europe and
strives to be an active part of Europe’s integration.
I do not wish to imply that there are no obstacles to
the progress of that integration. Europe may have high
levels of prosperity and deeply rooted democracies and it
may be one of the most stable regions in the world, but
the ghosts of the past and leanings towards near-forgotten
forms of nationalistic chauvinism are still with us. These
are in direct contradiction to the very idea of a
cooperative and multicultural Europe; they endanger the
processes of integration. Unexplained and unjustifiable
impediments have already been raised against Slovenia’s
association with the European Union.
In closing, allow me to express Slovenia’s great
satisfaction that our proposal that the moral and ethical
aspects of social developments be considered at the World
Summit for Social Development in Copenhagen next year
has been widely accepted. We are particularly glad that
Slovenia will have the honour to host the United Nations
seminar on the ethical and spiritual dimensions of social
progress and development, an event to which we attach
great importance. If one thing is certain, it is that
economic, scientific and technological views on
development do not exist in a vacuum. The United
Nations Charter calls for the fostering of the prosperity,
harmony and freedom of people both as individuals and
as cultural entities. This ultimate objective should be
borne in mind in all the United Nations endeavours.
It is my hope that under your leadership, the
Assembly will take positive steps in that direction.


I should like sincerely to congratulate Mr.
Essy on his election as president over the forty-ninth
session of the General Assembly. His country and mine
maintain friendly diplomatic relations and close links
strengthened by the historic ties between Africa and Latin
America. I wish him success in his endeavours and offer
him the fullest cooperation of the Peruvian delegation.
We live in an age that confronts the international
community as a whole, and the United Nations in
particular, with big challenges. Representative democracy
and the market economy have spread throughout the world,
along with an intensification of integration processes and
the globalization of trade.
Nevertheless, international peace and security have not
yet been consolidated in all regions. We have witnessed
events such as the unexpected collapse of States that had
seemed to be solid, episodes of massive violence within
some countries and the tragic and complex situations that
resulted, persistent aggression against a Member of this
Organization and the exacerbation of nationalism in many
parts of the world. All these things challenge the present
capacity of the United Nations to respond.
Faced with such challenges, the United Nations must
reaffirm its central role as the indispensable leader in the
maintenance of international peace and security and in the
promotion of world-wide development. This is its duty, not
only because of the universal character of the United
Nations system, but also because of the contractual
significance of the instrument by which it was established.
In this respect, we must bear in mind that the
potential of the United Nations as the foremost
international Organization can be reinforced by increased
and more efficient coordination with the regional
organizations.
By the same token, we attach special importance to
the General Assembly’s exercise of the powers assigned
to it by the Charter, as well as to the expansion and
reform of the Security Council. With regard to the latter,
we should seek to correct the imbalances in its present
composition, improve its decision-making machinery and
make its working methods more transparent, while
striving to make its composition truly representative of all
Member States of the Organization.
As the Secretary-General pointed out in his reports,
"An Agenda for Peace" (A/47/277) and "An Agenda for
Development" (A/48/935), it now appears to be politically
feasible to respond to the multiple requirements of
international peace and security while encouraging
cooperation in the social and economic field, because the
complementarity of these elements is such that without
economic development there can be no peace or security.
"An Agenda for Peace" must therefore be complemented
by an agenda for development. In this way the United
Nations could lead the international community, in
accordance with the purposes and principles of its
Charter, and integrate the actions of our Organization with
the work of the Bretton Woods institutions, and above all
the World Trade Organization.
In this regard, we share the concern of the Secretary-
General, who has warned that the subject of development
is in danger of vanishing from the United Nations agenda.
We must therefore emphasize that the grave problems
related to development must be included in our
Organization’s work and that developed and developing
countries must agree on the need to address, urgently and
adequately, critical situations such as dire poverty.
The coming World Summit for Social Development
offers us an opportunity that we must seize. Peru, which
took part in the early stages of the process that led to the
decision to convene that Summit, will contribute to it the
national programme for social development that the
Government of President Fujimori has been carrying out,
a programme that gives priority attention to the basic
10

services of health, education and the administration of
justice, particularly for the poorest.
In the same context, Peru believes that the internal
efforts of developing countries in the vital spheres of social
and economic advance must be matched by high-priority
multilateral and bilateral cooperation.
I must also observe that in most of our countries
social development also means stability. Therefore,
continuing democratization and modernization is largely
dependent on the assignment of high priority to this
inescapable challenge.
Along with the problems of development, the rapidly
evolving situation today presents us, as an international
Organization, with a number of particularly complex
subjects. Outstanding among them is the process of
reconciliation and peace in the Middle East, which will
have important effects on regional and world stability and
security, as well as on trade, regional cooperation and
disarmament. Peru supports this process, and believes that
resolutions adopted in the General Assembly must properly
reflect that reality and contribute to the maintenance of an
appropriate political climate to advance the negotiating
process.
We also welcome the new South Africa, which
embodies the fulfilment of the essential principles of the
Charter and which is a possible factor for regional stability.
It also provides an example of democratic change.
The tragic situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which
has made clear the serious limitations of multilateral
organizations, demands increased efforts by the
international community to ensure an early and lasting
peace.
I now wish to address a subject that we cannot ignore,
one that affects the international community as a whole and
that is particularly delicate for my own country: the drug
problem. Peru reiterates its resolve to continue to fight
illegal drug trafficking, as well as its conviction that this
serious problem urgently requires the unwavering political
commitment of the international community. That alone
will make it possible to adopt concrete and realistic
measures to stand up to this scourge in accordance with the
mandates of the Global Programme of Action adopted by
the General Assembly in 1990.
International coordination and cooperation against
drug-trafficking are indispensable. In that regard, I am
pleased to point out that the recent Summit of Presidents
of the member countries of the Rio Group accepted the
proposal of the President of the Republic of Peru, Alberto
Fujimori, to coordinate legislation to penalize money-
laundering, allow the confiscation of property linked to
drug-trafficking, establish swift extradition procedures,
promote judicial and police cooperation on this matter and
bolster cooperation for alternative development.
My country also pays special attention to human
rights. Their promotion and defence constitute an
inescapable obligation of the international community,
which must therefore reinforce and improve current
mechanisms of the system for the protection of human
rights, in order to increase their efficacy.
We are pleased to note the growing recognition and
support by this international Organization for those
countries that, like us, are continuing to struggle to defend
life and civilized ways of coexistence against the
unjustifiable and irrational violence of terrorism. For us,
this means that the international community has made
progress, by recognizing that in countries such as Peru
terrorist groups are the primary, the true, violators of
human rights.
In the current context of renewal, we supported the
creation of the post of United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights, in an effort to improve
United Nations measures to prevent and monitor
violations of human rights, whether the violators be
government agents or others. It is a matter of pride for
our region that a distinguished Latin American diplomat
is the first to fill this high office.
Within this chamber last year, the President of Peru
announced that the leader of the bloodiest terrorist
movement in the Western Hemisphere - caught as a result
of our successful campaign for national peace - had
acknowledged in writing the clear defeat of his totalitarian
aims and his bloodthirsty methods. Today I am pleased
to confirm that Peru is swiftly progressing towards
reconciliation and peace. The Peruvian strategy, which
involves the State and civil society, has borne fruit, as
evidenced by the mass desertions of terrorists as a result
of the "repentance law" passed on repentance and the
return of peaceful villagers to their homes, with the
support and backing of the State.
My country, having guaranteed democracy and
economic freedom, now has, after many years, excellent
prospects. We have established a new national
11

environment by consistently applying economic, social and
pacification policies. The results prove that we have taken
the correct path, as shown by the growth in gross national
product - 7 per cent last year, and projected to be between
9 per cent and 10 per cent this year, figures which
constitute the highest growth rates in the hemisphere.
This new situation will allow us, for the first time in
decades, to give social issues the priority they deserve. The
economic policies followed in Peru have made possible a
social programme implemented through non-inflationary
investment, with our own resources. This programme has
the technical backing of international financial institutions
and is in line with the conceptual approaches on social
development promoted by the World Bank, the United
Nations Development Programme and a growing number of
non-governmental organizations that share a belief in
putting the human being at the core of development efforts.
To do otherwise would be to make sustainable long-term
growth impossible. This essential task for the whole of
Peruvian society requires the cooperation and support of the
international community.
My country’s contribution to change in the world has
been made possible by the efforts of our people, who have
enabled us to enjoy internal peace, security, stability and
economic growth. The path we are taking leads the most
tenacious nation in South America, a people of long-proven
creativity, on the threshold of a new millennium with the
enthusiasm, the ability and the necessary tools for its
development.


It is a great honour for me, as President of
Colombia, to speak in the General Assembly, which, as the
Organization reaches the fiftieth anniversary of its
establishment, remains the principal forum for the
discussion of topics of concern to mankind and for the
search for peaceful solutions to its distressing problems.
Fifty years ago, when the United Nations system was
created, the world hoped that the spectre of war was finally
being laid to rest. But lack of understanding between
nations, ideological fanaticism and the politics of force led
to the world’s polarization into two antagonistic blocs. For
many years, the cold war put on ice the hopes held at the
beginning for developing a world-wide system of
coexistence. Such coexistence reappears today when we
see a black person at the helm of South Africa; when we
see Palestinians and Jews discussing fruit groves in the hills
of the Golan; and when we see all Berliners drinking good
Colombian coffee on the spot where the wall of infamy
once stood.
Before the end of this century, we shall have to strive
to resolve peacefully the most important conflict to outlive
the cold war: the conflict with the brotherly Republic of
Cuba.
We now have the happy opportunity of reviving the
spirit of the San Francisco Charter and of reinitiating the
deferred task of building a new world system based on
solidarity, respect for the self-determination of peoples
and the real search for better living conditions for all - as
was stated a few years ago before the General Assembly,
by a distinguished Colombian, Indalecio Liévano Aguirre,
in his capacity as its President.
The history of the 1990s must not be one more
record of the frustration of our aspirations to peace, well-
being and justice. Our objective can be nothing less than
the human person. Our actions must be directed towards
the struggle against poverty and for the attainment of
social justice. Our commitment is to make the arbitrary
use of power and abuses of human rights things of the
past.
But this task - this vital task - is not free of threats.
Neoprotectionism threatens the free-trade prospects of
developing countries. It is true that tariff protectionism
has come to an end, but a new and dangerous form of
protectionism is now emerging: non-tariff protectionism:
barriers to the export of plants and vegetables, customs
barriers, quotas, anti-dumping clauses, social clauses, the
rationale of "reasons of State", and fears of losing
elections. We developing countries are no longer
struggling against the barbed wire of hostile tariff
barriers: we are struggling against an army of invisible
enemies moved by the most diverse interests and
systematically opposed to the rhetorical aspiration to free
trade - an aspiration that would seem to have something
in common with our feelings about paradise: we all want
to get there, but not quite yet.
Impoverishment is another threat. Granted, we are
all committed to the openness of our economies, but that
must not mean that we can ignore the need to manage the
obvious social costs. Unemployment, the postponement
of social investment programmes and neglect of the living
conditions of the rural population can ultimately
delegitimize in vast regions of the world - this, at least, is
true of Latin America - the efforts made over many years
to democratize our political systems. The only thing
more serious than poverty is impoverishment, and it is
beginning to make itself felt in many parts of the world.
Either we leaders renew our commitment to the people or
the social costs of economic change will in the end
destroy our achievements in political consolidation.
Finally, there is the threat of the formation of blocs.
The development of economic blocs runs counter to the
6

idea of a world based on the democratic rules of free trade
for all on an equal footing. What is at stake today is not
the exchange of goods and services but rather the exchange
of the means necessary to produce those goods and
services.
Selective appropriation of the means of production
puts those of us in the developing countries in the worst of
worlds. We do not have the means of production nor do
we have fair access to them, but we do have the arduous
responsibility of competing on an equal footing with the
world’s most industrialized countries.
It is not a matter of repeating the third-world litany of
complaints and demands. The point here is to define new
rules that can enable us to gain access to technology and to
finance our infrastructures on favourable terms, that can
enable us to reach acceptable levels of competitiveness, that
can enable us to break with dependency on the cartels of
service companies and to buy market outlets in a world
where what counts and what is important is not producing,
but selling.
That aspiration to develop new conditions that can
enable us to play a vital role within the new spectrum of
world forces must take the shape of a new development
model for our countries, an alternative model which I
should like to discuss with you this afternoon in this Hall.
I am speaking of an alternative model that will be an
alternative to the protectionist system of the 1960s, for the
globalization of the economy requires not only open and
competitive economies but an alternative to the
neoliberalism that irresponsibly leaves it to the market to
correct all imbalances.
I am speaking of an alternative to the old assistance
populism, for there must be social change based on
economic criteria, and for an alternative to fierce
capitalism, which sets up the rule of every man for himself
as a form of social selectionism.
I am speaking of an alternative to the blind criteria of
public interventionism as well as an alternative to attempts
to sell out the State to the highest self-interested bidders, to
the Government abandoning its own responsibilities with
regard to the unprotected masses.
I am speaking of an alternative to anachronistic
concepts of representative democracy but also of an
alternative for meeting attempts to reduce the free play of
democracy to sterile confrontation between private interests.
The objective of this alternative model, the model of
the South, should be the establishment of a new and more
productive citizen in the economy, a citizen who
participates to a greater degree in politics and who is
more supportive in the social sphere.
Words and phrases like "social investment", "good
governmen t" , "ag r i cu l tu ra l deve lopmen t" ,
"competitiveness", "harmonization" and "gradualness" are
all part of a new alternative vocabulary that will enable us
to speak the language of a new identity, of our own
identity as countries seeking our own way.
The new model of development, if it is to be
genuine and not simply an abstraction, must take into
account some basic elements.
First, it must allow for the modernization of our
productive structures. We gain nothing if we continue to
open markets when we have nothing to sell, because we
produce nothing or very little.
Modernization goes hand in hand with the
development of an adequate infrastructure of
transportation and communications and the optimum use
of energy sources.
We must develop new conditions of productivity,
especially in the field of technology, and adopt more
efficient and environmentally sustainable production
processes. The world today is not divided between the
haves and the have-nots but, rather, between those who
know and those who do not, and we, the developing
countries, are among those who lack knowledge. We
must buy, develop and assimilate new technologies.
Secondly, there is the concept of social solidarity.
Our greatest challenge in this sphere is to give legitimacy
to a new economic system through real social-
development proposals. Investing in the human being is
the best business. Investment in health, education and
housing is highly profitable, not only in social terms but -
especially - in economic terms.
Thirdly, in addressing those two great revolutions of
competitiveness and solidarity it is necessary to change
the ideas of those who today act as agents of the
economic process.
What should the role of Government be? Above and
beyond the dilemma of privatization or nationalization,
the dilemma of whether or not to reduce the size of
7

Government, it is imperative that Government work, and
that it do so honestly. Good governance must be our goal
in reforming Government.
Good Government means building a new type of
Government, one that promotes efficiency. It means the
training of technically skilled bureaucracies. It means
transparency and the streamlining of administrative
procedures in such a way that the roots of corruption are
extirpated. It means administrative decentralization and
citizen participation, and it means the organizing of civil
society on bases other than the old contradictions between
capital and labour.
Fourthly, and lastly, we must bear in mind that this
process is occurring in the context of the globalization of
the world economy and of interindependence among
peoples. The principal problems affecting every country
today are no longer merely national in nature; they are
global, and for that reason they require the coordinated
action of all nations.
The new cooperation the international community
requires is based on adjusting domestic policies to global
objectives within a framework of respect for the
sovereignty of States, the principles of international law and
domestic legislation. Only if we can attain a new concept
of cooperation will we avoid the pitfall of interventionism,
which threatens to make its way through the open door of
interdependence and globalization. Cooperation, as an
alternative to intervention, is the route that can ensure for
the community of nations the fulfilment of its aspirations
for peace and stability.
I come from Colombia, a country that respects
international law and the principles that ensure peaceful
coexistence; a country that has placed its faith in Latin
American and Caribbean integration; a country with a
dynamic Constitution and an economy sound as few others
in Latin America; a country that is moving forward thanks
to the sacrifices and steadfast labour of its people, creative
people avid for progress and imbued with a sense of the
magic of life about which García Márques, our Nobel
laureate, has written; a country searching for peace because
it so loves life.
The times we are now living in are times of crisis, but
also of opportunities. In Colombia we have had to learn to
live with terrible difficulties, always inspired by the biblical
invitation to maintain a vision as a people in order to
prevail as a nation.
I know that some here must have asked themselves
why I have not referred in this speech to the problem
with which my country is everywhere associated: the
problem of drug trafficking. I have not done so because
in Colombia we believe that we are entitled to be
recognized by other, positive factors: those that identify
us as an honest, hard-working people that offers respect
to friendly countries and expects respect in return.
Of course, we have struggled and will continue to
struggle out of conviction, while paying a high price to
fight the scourge of mankind that is drug trafficking. But
I must confess that we sometimes feel alone in this task.
We feel alone when we see the drug consumption rates
increase in countries that request our help to defeat a
problem whose origins and consequences concern all of
us. We feel alone, very much alone, when we see
mayors who are avowed chronic drug users elected by
popular vote. We feel alone when, after extensive efforts
to eradicate illicit crops, the doors are closed to us when
it comes to selling exactly those products that we have
managed to cultivate, with great effort, as alternative
crops.
Therefore, in the midst of this lonely struggle that
has left many victims dead in the fields, a struggle of
which I count myself a fortunate survivor, what many of
us want is for Colombia to be looked at from a different
perspective - that it be recognized for the soundness of its
economy, that Colombia be taken into account when it
comes to investment decisions. We want those present
here to get to know the Colombian people - my people.
We want visitors to see our country so that many more
people the world over will be as much in love with my
country as are those of us who were born, who live and
who will die in that privileged corner of Latin America -
Colombia.


First, I should like to
offer you, Sir, my personal congratulations on your election
as President of the General Assembly at its forty-ninth
session, and also those of the European Union, on whose
behalf I am addressing the Assembly today. We wish you
luck and success in your high office.
We thank Ambassador Insanally for the wise
leadership with which he guided the forty-eighth session
of the General Assembly to a successful conclusion.
I am addressing the Assembly on behalf of a Europe
that has become more closely integrated as a result of the
Maastricht Treaty, a Europe which in a few weeks’ time
will admit four new members, and which intends to
broaden its cooperation based on partnership with the
world’s other regions as well. I am speaking for a
Europe that is committed to world peace and development
and whose political actions are determined by its belief in
individual freedom, democracy and the rule of law, a
Europe which sees in the realization of justice a crucial
precondition for avoiding war and the use of force and
which is prepared to play its part in promoting the
economic development of all regions, the struggle against
hunger, and measures to protect the Earth’s natural
sources of life. But I am speaking above all on behalf of
a Europe that wishes to place the United Nations in a
better position to meet its foremost obligation as
guarantor of peace and security in the world.
Next year’s fiftieth anniversary of the United
Nations coincides with that marking the end of the
Second World War. The founding of the United Nations
was the response to that catastrophe, which had its origins
in Europe. Today we can look back on impressive
achievements by the United Nations. The 51 members in
1945 have grown into a membership of 184. The United
Nations has thus developed into a truly universal
Organization.
By recently concluding the negotiations on the Law
of the Sea Convention, the United Nations has made
outstanding progress in promoting the reconciliation of
interests and the peaceful settlement of disputes around
the world. The choice of Hamburg as seat of the
International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea is a token
of confidence in Germany and an obligation for my
country.
The achievements of the United Nations are
considerable, yet it is often the object of unfair criticism.
The United Nations can be only as good as its Members
allow it to be. It needs their active support. Many of its
personnel, both soldiers and civilians, have done their
utmost to help alleviate distress and save lives. No small
number of them have lost their own lives in the process.
We pay tribute to them and honour their memory.
15

Many of us believed that the ending of the cold war
would usher in an era of peace. Today we know,
unfortunately, that that hope was premature. Day in and
day out, hundreds of people are falling victim to hostilities
and thousands more are dying of starvation or disease.
What has happened and is still happening in Bosnia,
Somalia and Rwanda is appalling.
The European Union sees a response to these global
challenges in a strengthening of the United Nations and of
the multilateral system for the safeguarding of peace world
wide, in more intensive preventive diplomacy and conflict
prevention within the United Nations and regional
institutions, in respect for human rights in the world and for
the rule of law, and in closer development cooperation in
and among the regions.
We Europeans therefore welcome the report of the
Secretary-General on an Agenda for Development. An
Agenda for Development must soon find its place alongside
the Agenda for Peace. With his report, Mr. Boutros-Ghali
has again pointed the way for our Organization’s future
development and work. I wish to convey to him the
appreciation of the European Union. We pledge a
constructive contribution to the debate on this document.
Following the disaster of the Second World War,
Europe had the opportunity for political renewal and it took
that opportunity. We Europeans derive courage and
strength from that renewal. No other region in the world
has such a dense network of regional, intergovernmental
and supranational institutions, and no region in the world
has such close relations with other nations and their
organizations. In the field of security, therefore, it is our
aim to create a network of mutually supporting institutions
which will include, together with the European Union (EU),
the Western European Union (WEU), the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Conference on
Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE). All must
work closely with the United Nations. NATO and the
WEU are already helping the United Nations to carry out
its difficult mission in the former Yugoslavia.
Because our interests are interwoven as they have
always been, we will not allow ourselves to be discouraged
by set-backs and will therefore do our utmost to bring
about a peaceful settlement in the former Yugoslavia. The
United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) has our
unreserved support. The terrible war of destruction in
Bosnia and Herzegovina must be brought to an end.
Federation is, we believe, a first and indispensable step
towards a peace settlement. Winter will be here soon and
the people will once again have cold and hunger to
contend with. But the precondition for lasting progress
and for peace is the will for reconciliation among all
ethnic groups. The European Union is trying to help, and
we shall continue to do so. For that reason we have
established an administrative office in Mostar, which
began its work in July under the courageous leadership of
Hans Koschnick.
The entire international community must constantly
make it unmistakably clear to the Bosnian Serbs that in
rejecting the peace plan they cannot reckon with tacit
approval. There must be no toleration of a policy of war
and expulsion. We seek a solution for the Croatian
territories under UNPROFOR protection which will be
acceptable to both sides. The territorial integrity of
Croatia must be respected. Autonomy arrangements will
have to be found for the Krajina Serbs. We Europeans
believe that an extension of the mandate of UNPROFOR
is absolutely essential for this purpose.
The United Nations envisages a world in which it is
not the law of the strongest but rather international law
that prevails. We Europeans share that vision. We are
even more convinced by what has happened in the former
Yugoslavia that a relapse into divisive nationalism must
be prevented.
We, the Members of the United Nations, must
summon the strength to make a great joint effort to
provide the United Nations and its Secretary-General with
the means to meet their global responsibility. The United
Nations must become what its founding fathers aspired to
in their noble vision nearly 50 years ago: mankind’s
principal guardian of the peace.
But we, the Members of the United Nations, must
above all be prepared to stand up for the cause of peace.
The members of the European Union have played, and
are continuing to play, a major role in helping maintain
or restore peace in many of the world’s trouble spots on
behalf of the United Nations. We Europeans are guided
by the following basic principles.
First, for its peace-keeping measures the United
Nations should be able to rely on the broadest possible
support and involvement of its Members. Such
operations ought to foster peace and unity among them
but not divide the community of nations.
16

Secondly, we Europeans will always be in favour of
giving priority to non-military means of safeguarding peace
wherever possible. But aggressors must also realize that
the United Nations is capable of military intervention where
other means of achieving the aims of the Charter have
failed, and that it has the will to take such action.
Thirdly, the use of military force cannot be an end in
itself. Successful peace-keeping presupposes an
unequivocal mandate based on international law, a
convincing political plan for settling the conflict, and the
equitable participation of the Member States.
Fourthly, we Europeans welcome the idea of stand-by
arrangements developed by Secretary-General
Boutros-Ghali. It can effectively help reduce the length of
time between the decision to mount a peace-keeping
operation and its actual implementation. Many members of
the European Union, including Germany, are willing to
contribute to stand-by arrangements.
Fifthly, in many countries military training is geared
solely to the traditional duties of the army. The specific
tasks of peace-keeping require a completely different kind
of training. The national preparation of Blue Helmets
needs to be coordinated to a greater degree by the United
Nations. What is needed for this are common training
guidelines and the training capacity of the United Nations.
Joint training and exercises are, at the same time, important
steps in confidence-building.
Speaking as the Foreign Minister of Germany, I would
add that last year I stated in the Assembly that my country
was willing to shoulder more responsibilities with regard to
United Nations peace-keeping operations. Today I can
confirm that Germany will be able to join fully in
peace-keeping operations of the United Nations, the
German Federal Constitutional Court having cleared the
way a few months ago.
The European Union looks for the revitalization of the
United Nations and its various organizations. In the course
of the forty-eighth session of the General Assembly a
working group considered all aspects of the question of
increasing the membership of the Security Council and
other matters related to the Security Council. The working
group had a substantive and constructive discussion. Its
report states that
"... while there was convergence of views that the
membership of the Security Council should be
enlarged, there was also agreement that the scope and
nature of such enlargement require further
discussion." (A/48/47, para. 8)
Security Council reform is an important issue which
requires a productive outcome. These days, the most
important decisions on security and peace are made in the
Security Council. We therefore look forward to a report
on enlargement of the Security Council membership and
related issues from the open-ended working group, and to
productive results.
Transparency in the Council’s decision-making
processes is important, particularly in peace-keeping,
where the interests of contributor nations are involved.
Indeed, the cost of establishing and consolidating peace
is enormous. The explosion of the peace-keeping budget
has almost brought the United Nations to a standstill. In
order to overcome the financial crisis, three tasks must be
accomplished.
The United Nations urgently requires more efficient
management and better organization. The creation of the
Office of Internal Oversight Services by the General
Assembly at its forty-eighth session was an important step
towards this objective, and the fact that a German has
been appointed as the first head of that Office is a mark
of confidence in my country. Members’ contributions
must be brought more into line with their actual capacity
to pay. The aim of comprehensive financial reform must
be to establish a scale that is transparent and reliable,
reflects Members’ financial situations, is automatically
adapted to changed national circumstances, and gives
consideration to the needs of countries with low per
capita incomes. But it is crucial that all Members be
willing to meet their membership obligations. We cannot
have a situation in which the United Nations has
difficulty carrying out its responsibilities because
individual Members feel exempted from their duties.
It is always better to prevent a fire than to have to
put it out. The European experience is that conflicts must
be prevented -but this is not a purely European
experience. We bank on the power of preventive
diplomacy, confidence-building and the early detection of
conflicts. The United Nations must further enlarge and
strengthen its instruments of preventive diplomacy. This
includes helping countries along the road to democracy
and observing elections. The establishment of and respect
for human and minority rights, as well as measures to
bring about economic and social stability, are other basic
elements of prevention.
17

The Declaration and Programme of Action of the
World Conference on Human Rights held in Vienna calls
for more active implementation. Our priority must be to
support the High Commissioner for Human Rights. In
addition, we must substantially increase the resources
available in the United Nations for human rights activities.
It is, I believe, inadequate for the United Nations to provide
only 1 per cent of its funds for this task.
Work on the establishment of an international criminal
court must proceed apace. Human rights and the protection
of minorities are indivisibly linked. Ethnic or cultural
arrogance and the curtailing of minority rights are one
cause of the ever-swelling refugee flows in our world
today. That is why minorities need the protection of the
United Nations. We Europeans are striving to implement
this objective. In Europe, the Pact on Stability is designed
to promote political stability and the protection of
minorities.
We do not want to close our eyes to our own
shortcomings. There must be no room for racism and
xenophobia in Europe. That is why we have made it our
goal to develop a Union-wide strategy against racism and
xenophobia in the course of the coming year. We need
more efficient management of humanitarian relief actions.
The need for resources and measures to alleviate emergency
situations through disaster relief operations is likely to
increase rather than decrease.
We expect the United Nations Disaster Relief
Coordinator to ensure more effective coordination of
measures within the United Nations system. He must be
able to intervene before it is too late for the people
affected. I should like to stress that point. Work on the
drafting of a convention for the protection of the work of
humanitarian organizations must be brought to a speedy
conclusion.
One task of preventive policy as we understand it is to
combat terrorism. There is no justification for terrorism.
Drugs and organized crime are an ever-increasing danger
not only to our young people, but also to the social and
political stability of whole societies. To combat these
dangers we need international alliances, and we need them
urgently. The European Union offers comprehensive
cooperation and the experience it has gained in this field.
Disarmament policy, too, is preventive policy. Over
the past few years, major successes have been attained in
this field. These must now be made irreversible. The
START Treaties must be implemented quickly. In Europe,
the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces has proved to
be a milestone.
Uncleared mines are amongst the worst legacies of
war and civil war. We Europeans are in favour of the
establishment of a United Nations fund for mine-clearing
and of more stringent provisions under international law
to protect civilian populations.
The increasing proliferation of weapons of mass
destruction, the continuing operation of unsafe nuclear
plants and the smuggling of plutonium and other nuclear
materials are among the new global dangers of our age.
We must counter them at the national and global levels.
We Europeans urgently appeal to North Korea to fulfil its
international obligations. We in the European Union are
committed to the indefinite, unconditional extension of the
Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. In
Geneva, we want to arrive at a universal and universally
verifiable comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty. I
believe that it is also high time that consensus was
reached there on negotiations to bring about a ban on the
manufacture of weapons-grade fissile material.
The European Union, together with its partners, is
providing considerable funds for improving the safety of
nuclear plants in the neighbouring countries to our east.
What happened at Chernobyl must never, ever be
repeated. That would indeed be terrible.
I appeal to all signatory States to ensure speedy
ratification and implementation of the chemical weapons
Convention at the national level in order for it quickly to
become fully effective.
The dangers I have just mentioned affect us all. As
those dangers have a global dimension, action by the
United Nations, too, is called for. At its summit meeting
on 31 January 1992, the Security Council rightly stated
that the proliferation of all weapons of mass destruction
constitutes a threat to international peace and security.
The United Nations, the Security Council and all of us
must resolutely shoulder our responsibility to overcome
these new threats.
A fair balancing of interests through the ever-closer
regional integration of States and ever-increasing
cooperation between regions of our planet in the spirit of
Article 1 of the Charter of the United Nations are the
necessary response to the huge economic, ecological and
social challenges and the manifold ethnic conflicts we are
facing today - unfortunately, I might add. No one region
18

alone can master the global tasks confronting us. Nor can
the United Nations accomplish everything itself. The
burden on the United Nations can be substantially reduced
with the help of regional associations and cooperation. We
should strive to achieve that objective.
For Europe, the post-war era has finally reached an
end. A few weeks ago, the last Russian soldiers left
Germany. Russian troops have also withdrawn from the
Baltic States and other Eastern European countries. Now
the aim must be to prevent new divides from emerging in
Europe. The European Union will become not a "Fortress
Europe" but a Europe based on partnership and solidarity.
The European Union is supporting the countries of
Central and Eastern Europe on their way to democracy and
the establishment of market economies. The peoples in the
reformist States fought for their freedom. We encouraged
them in their struggle and we will not now abandon them.
We will gradually smooth their path towards the
Euro-Atlantic institutions. It is important to mention that
there will be no pan-European order of peace without or
against Russia. The European Union has concluded
partnership and cooperation agreements with Russia and
Ukraine. The North Atlantic Alliance’s "Partnership for
Peace" enhances Europe’s security.
The CSCE, as a new instrument of conflict-prevention,
confidence-building and conflict resolution, can set an
example for other regions of the world. And it can, as a
regional arrangement under Chapter VIII of the Charter,
relieve the United Nations as the guardian of peace. At the
CSCE Summit in December the European Union will urge,
on the basis of a German-Dutch initiative, that the CSCE be
given priority in conflict settlement and prevention within
its area and that it be equipped accordingly.
The European Union wants to further extend and
tighten its network of regional cooperation. Transatlantic
relations with the United States and Canada remain the
cornerstone of European policy. The Summit meeting
between the European Union and the United States in
Berlin in July this year confirmed our resolve to further
strengthen transatlantic relations.
We are seeking closer relations with the countries of
Asia. In Germany a few days ago we discussed with the
Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) the
possibilities for even more intensive political and economic
cooperation. We are following with interest ASEAN’s
initiative to launch a policy dialogue on security in
South-East and East Asia, and I wish to emphasize the
European Union’s interest in and willingness to cooperate
more closely with the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation
Council (APEC).
The European Council meeting in Corfu reaffirmed
that it attaches great importance to relations with the
countries of Latin America and with their regional
associations. The institutionalized dialogue with the Rio
Group has become for us an important element for the
consolidation of democracy and peace. We intend to
broaden the cooperation agreement with the States of the
Southern Cone Common Market (MERCOSUR).
Through its policy on the Mediterranean, the
European Union will have made available a total of
roughly $9.6 billion between 1975 and 1996. Europe
attaches great importance to security in the
Mediterranean.
From the outset the European Union actively
supported the Middle East peace process, playing a
leading role in international assistance for the
development of the Palestinian economy and society.
With the roughly $600 million earmarked for direct aid
from 1994 to 1998, the European Union is the
Palestinians’ largest international donor.
Cooperation in southern Africa has made great
strides. The course South Africa has embarked upon
under Nelson Mandela shows that it is possible for former
adversaries to be reconciled and to shape a common
future, given the necessary political will and wise
leadership. At the Berlin conference with the States of
the Southern African Development Community (SADC)
early this month the European Union initiated a new
phase of cooperation with southern Africa.
We in Europe want closer dialogue with the
Organization of African Unity (OAU) on conflict
prevention and security cooperation because we want
partnership with the countries of Africa and thereby a
greater United Nations peace-keeping capacity.
Agreement on an agenda for development is
becoming ever more urgent. One billion people in this
world are still living in absolute poverty. Global
expenditure on arms still amounts to as much as the
income of half of the five and a half billion people on our
planet.
Poverty, increasing demographic pressure and
irresponsible harming of the environment have made the
19

dangers to peace and stability greater, not smaller. The
Conference on Environment and Development in Rio and
the International Conference on Population and
Development, which ended in Cairo a few days ago,
confirmed that there are no simple answers to global
problems. The two conferences none the less sent out an
encouraging signal: there is growing recognition that we
must tackle such problems together, and this I believe is a
very important basis for the World Social Summit, which
will be held next year in Denmark.
In many countries women are still excluded from
active participation in public life. We expect the World
Conference on Women, to be held in Beijing next year, to
heighten awareness of this.
In the Maastricht Treaty we Europeans for the first
time made development policy an integral part of a treaty
system for Europe. We undertook to seek the sustainable
economic and social development of the South, to promote
its integration into the global economy and to combat
poverty.
Despite the huge budget difficulties facing its member
States, the European Union has increased its development
assistance from over $1 billion in 1988 to almost $3 billion
today. Funds for emergency disaster relief and food aid
were increased to $1 billion this year. Even more
important than such financial transfers, however, is the task
of integrating the countries of the South into the world
economy. Without doubt, the conclusion of the Uruguay
Round improved the chances of growth for all States
participating in world trade. The aim now must be for the
Treaty to enter into force on 1 January 1995, as planned,
and for the newly-established World Trade Organization to
commence work.
The treaty-based cooperation between the European
Union and the other regions of the world is designed to
further liberalize world trade. Every region should be able
to participate in the European market. That is why we
want to complete the forthcoming review of Lomé IV,
including the new finance protocol, on time, and we are
working to achieve that end.
Speaking here last year I suggested the development
of an early detection capacity for environmental disasters in
developing countries, and for the European Union I can
today say this: World-wide energy consumption is
increasing, although the use of fossil fuels is already
endangering climatic stability. In particular, we, the
industrialized countries, therefore need a more
environment-friendly and resource-friendly attitude on the
part of producers and consumers and increased recycling
of raw materials. Reducing carbon dioxide emissions
must be tackled as a matter of urgency.
The destruction of the forests continues mercilessly.
Soil erosion, loss of bio-diversity and impaired
regeneration are the consequences. This destruction must
be halted. We Europeans will seek better international
cooperation in the United Nations for the sustainable
utilization and protection of the forests. The United
Nations is the guardian not only of peace, but also of the
environment.
The historian Arnold Toynbee was right when he
concluded that people are entirely capable of learning
from disasters and finding responses to historic
challenges. Today we Europeans know that only
integration and cooperation lead to the desired goal, and
the international community’s response to the global
problems is and has to be to strengthen the United
Nations. Our central tasks for the future are: first, to
secure peace world-wide; secondly, to respect human
rights and the rule of law; and, thirdly, to create the
conditions for lasting stability through economic and
social development.
Our common goal is to create a better world for all.
But the determination with which we implement this goal
in practice is the precondition for success against which
we will be measured.


May I first congratulate you, Sir, on your election to
preside over our work.
I wish you every success in your presidency, and
assure you that you may rely on the full cooperation of
the delegation of Chile.
I wish also to greet the Secretary-General and to
assure him once again of our support in the performance
of his difficult task. When he visited Chile a few days
after the inauguration of President Eduardo Frei, the
Secretary-General had an opportunity to appreciate our
readiness to cooperate in the activities of the United
Nations system, in the conviction that multilateral action
was essential to the strengthening of international peace
and security and to the improvement of the living
conditions of men and women the world over.
36

The fall of the ideological barriers imposed by the
cold war gave rise to expectations of an era of peace and
global security. These expectations are strengthened by the
spread of democracy and the emergence of a new
awareness of the importance of human rights throughout the
world. At the same time, the processes of globalization and
economic interdependence are creating new opportunities
for progress and making the dissemination of technology
and knowledge more feasible.
Nevertheless, five years after the end of the cold war
we must acknowledge that the reality has fallen far short of
our dreams. The last decade of this century is one of
uncertainty and contradictions. Regrettably, along with the
signs of hope there has been a re-emergence of many
economic, political, ethnic, religious and cultural conflicts
and a tendency towards fragmentation and differentiation,
which pose new threats to the peace and new challenges for
the international order.
This process of transition has enhanced the role of the
United Nations as the guarantor of world peace and
security. It has compelled our Organization to assume new
responsibilities, both in negotiations for conflict prevention
and in operations for the maintenance or restoration of
peace.
Nevertheless, the immediate concern to maintain peace
and security should not prevent us from recognizing and
attacking the root causes of these conflicts. Poverty,
inequality between individuals and between nations,
environmental deterioration, unemployment and ignorance,
over-population, disorganized migration, and discrimination
against women and young people are today as important
factors in creating conflict as is military proliferation or
ideological confrontation - if not more so. Tackling these
problems requires using the imagination, creativity and
solidarity of the international community, as well as
resources as large as or even larger than those being spent
today on resolving conflicts that have already begun. The
security of human beings must be an international priority
along with widespread promotion of respect for human
rights.
In March of this year a new phase in the Chilean
democratic process began with the installation of the
Government of President Eduardo Frei. The continuity of
this process has made it possible to strengthen the stability
of democratic institutions and has increased respect for
human rights in the country. Of course, we do not claim
that our democracy is perfect; many aspects of it still
require further attention, and with that in mind draft
legislation on institutional changes is currently being
discussed in the National Congress. Nevertheless, we are
certain that, together with the other countries of Latin
America and the Caribbean, Chile will continue to
advance along the path of political stability, democratic
institutionality and respect for human rights.
Our recent economic experience has been successful.
Since the return of democracy we have had an average
annual growth of more than 6.5 per cent with a very low
unemployment rate and controlled inflation. On the basis
of these facts the Government has formulated an
ambitious modernization strategy focusing on three main
areas: education and training, development of
infrastructure, and modernization of the State. The
reforms in education seek to respond to the need for
effective and creative integration of young people into
society, and to meet the challenge of competitiveness.
The changes in the functioning of the State entail a
special concern for ethics and probity in the exercise of
power.
Attainment of these priorities should enable us to
raise our productivity and increase our capacity to
compete in international markets in the context of a
growing open economy. We are concerned at the
difficulty the major countries are nevertheless
experiencing in opening up their economies in sectors that
are vital to the equitable functioning of world trade. We
reject an international trade system based on
protectionism by the powerful directed against those who
are prepared to accept competition.
Nevertheless, economic advances would lack
meaning if they did not lead to a substantial improvement
in the living conditions of the majority of Chileans. The
Government recognizes this and has made the elimination
of extreme poverty an essential priority of its programme.
Without equity, growth would lose its raison d’être and
stability would be threatened by the tensions arising out
of the privations experienced by large sectors of the
population. Economic growth and social justice constitute
two terms of a single equation.
Latin America and the Caribbean are our natural
frame of reference and external action as a region that
shares both political and security interests and major
economic interests. The region has overcome the
political, institutional and economic crisis which afflicted
it in earlier decades. Most countries of the continent have
recently held elections, or will do so in the coming
months. The tranquillity, openness and participation that
37

today characterize these processes are convincing proof that
Latin America has embarked on a major process of
modernization and stability.
Along with this has come a major expansion of
cooperation and regional integration. Integration initiatives
and mechanisms of varying geographical coverage and
thematic scope have multiplied. Chile has participated in
these efforts, negotiating economic complementarity and
free-trade agreements with the majority of the countries in
the region. In the immediate future, Chile hopes to be able
to make a new contribution to the creation of a broad Latin
American economic area by achieving closer links with the
Common Market of the Southern Cone and by signing
complementarity agreements with Ecuador and Peru to add
to those already concluded with Mexico, Venezuela,
Argentina, Bolivia and Colombia.
We also view with enthusiasm the strengthening of our
links with the Central American and Caribbean countries
with which we have significantly expanded our political and
economic relations and cooperation.
We wish to promote a climate of peace, dialogue,
solidarity and mutual trust among the countries of the
region. We are sure that today this is more possible than
before, given the presence in the region of more democratic
regimes than it has ever had in its history.
In this context, the Rio Group has become a
significant regional political cooperation mechanism, and its
activity has recently expanded to cover economic
coordination aspects. The strengthening of the Rio Group,
which emerged from our continent’s re-democratization and
resurgence, is a key to Latin American’s ability to speak
with a unified voice in the new international context. That
is how our main partners in the world, with whom we meet
periodically in discussion forums to which we are attaching
increasing importance, perceive it.
Our policy towards Latin America and the Caribbean
is fully compatible with closer integration into world
markets. Chile today is a country that is open to the world,
dependent for 40 per cent of its gross national product on
external transactions and seeking to strengthen its relations
with the dynamic centres of growth and technological
information. We define our policy as an open regionalism,
one which seeks regional integration not in order to close
its markets but in order to achieve greater integration into
the world economy.
In this connection, our preference for multilateralism
is well known. We support all the phases of the
extensive negotiations under the Uruguay Round of the
General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), and are
now in the process of ratifying the agreements reached
there.
Our attitude in this respect matches that of our main
partners in Latin America. During the eight years for
which the Uruguay Round lasted the countries of the
region unilaterally reduced their tariffs by an average of
more than 50 per cent and contributed by making
significant concessions, despite the fact that not all the
objectives they were seeking to negotiate were achieved.
Accordingly, we now have the right to call for the
results of the Round to be implemented and, once the
World Trade Organization has been established, for
progress to be made in discussion of the many problems
the Round left pending, especially in relation to
agriculture and services.
Nevertheless, it is obvious that in the current phase
of the world economy multilateralism is being
accompanied by the negotiation of partial or regional
economic agreements which are progressively extending
over a large part of international trading activity. Hence
our interest in the integration progress in North America,
our search for sounder and more imaginative patterns of
economic relations with the European Union, our
imminent entry into the Asia-Pacific Economic
Cooperation Council (APEC) and our constant readiness,
shared with our region, to move ahead with economic
cooperation with all regions of the world.
Current international circumstances have led to
progress in various areas which it is important to
emphasize: the defeat of racism and apartheid, progress
in disarmament, the solution of international conflicts,
cooperation and détente - all issues which have led to the
strengthening of the world Organization.
Chile salutes the people and the Government of the
new South Africa in the person of President Nelson
Mandela and welcomes the success achieved by the
United Nations and by the South African people
themselves in building a democratic and just South Africa
which respects the principles of the Charter of the United
Nations.
We wish also to express our support for the peace
and negotiation process under way in Angola and
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Mozambique. We urge the rebel forces in both countries
to negotiate seriously and in good faith to end this conflict,
in compliance with United Nations resolutions. In the case
of Angola, the date of 30 September set by the President of
the Security Council for the ending of the negotiations is
approaching, and it is accordingly essential to arrive at a
speedy solution on the basis of the "Acordos de Paz".
Let me also express our satisfaction at the progress
made through the agreements between Israel and the
Palestine Liberation Organization, which are overcoming
obstacles to the attainment of a lasting peace throughout the
Middle East. On behalf of my country, I wish to reiterate
our support for the negotiations under way between Israel
and Jordan, as well as those between Israel and Lebanon
and between Israel and Syria.
In contrast to these positive steps, we view with great
concern the tragedy in Rwanda, horrified at its magnitude
and at the inability of the international community to
contain it. Chile conducted a national campaign of
solidarity with the children of Rwanda which met with an
extremely good response in our country. The risk is that,
if efforts are not made to eliminate the deep-lying causes of
tragedies such as this, other similar sources of tension may
arise in other countries, testing the capacity of our system
to react.
Likewise, we cannot fail to express our most profound
concern at and most energetic rejection of the extremes to
which the fratricidal struggle in the former Yugoslavia has
been taken. We urge the warring parties to abandon the
use of force as a means of solving their disputes and to
submit them to the internationally recognized peaceful
means of settlement.
Chile is also profoundly concerned at the situation in
Haiti resulting from the protracted usurpation of power and
the non-implementation of the Governors Island
agreements. The military occupation of a country is always
a regrettable occurrence that we should all like to avoid.
Nevertheless, it is important to recognize that in this
instance such action was taken on the basis of a Security
Council resolution and in response to repeated failure to
comply with international commitments, failure for which
the Haitian military alone are responsible.
We reiterate in this Assembly our support for the
measures taken by the United Nations and, in particular,
our full acceptance of the resolution adopted by the
Security Council. The Government of Chile will fulfil its
commitments to participate in the reconstruction of Haiti,
in the manner agreed upon with the democratic
Government of that country, as soon as institutional order
has been restored.
Chile has cooperated in peace-keeping operations,
and it has recently expressed its readiness to expand that
cooperation, in the profound conviction that improving the
capacity of the United Nations system in these efforts is
a priority task. The current bureaucratic mechanisms,
which place a very heavy burden on the countries
providing peace-keeping contingents, must be replaced by
others that will make it possible to provide the United
Nations with the best in human resources and equipment.
It is essential to reach agreement on a statute for
protection of United Nations personnel and to create an
international fund to administer the financing of
peace-keeping operations.
The new impetus in international disarmament
negotiations, particularly with respect to a nuclear-test-ban
treaty, increases the need for a global, democratic and
participatory approach in this area. There is an urgent
need to increase the membership of the Conference on
Disarmament - the only major multilateral negotiating
forum on these topics - to make it sufficiently
representative and enable it to respond appropriately to
the new challenges.
Chile considers that prohibiting the use of fissionable
materials for hostile purposes and universalizing security
guarantees for non-nuclear-weapon States would be
positive steps in the direction of nuclear disarmament.
Nevertheless, their success would depend on full
acceptance of inspection and verification procedures. In
step with progress in the substantive negotiations, a need
is making itself felt to extend and expand safeguards and
control regimes until they become universal, without
thereby impeding the access of developing countries to
sources of science and technology.
The recent ratification of the Treaty of Tlatelolco by
Chile, Argentina and Brazil, as well as Cuba’s decision to
sign it, will enable Latin America to become a genuine
nuclear-weapon-free zone. This, together with the
manifest reduction in tension and armaments in the
region, constitutes an effective contribution by our region
to world peace.
In this context, we have indicated our interest in
becoming a member of the Security Council for the
period beginning 1996. We have done so convinced that
Chile can legitimately and adequately represent the
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interests of Latin America and the Caribbean in that
important body.
We can and must make substantive progress in
designing better systems for preventing conflicts or taking
immediate action to restore peace. But, unless we
simultaneously attack the enormous inequalities and
privations that lie at the root of many conflicts we shall not
significantly reduce international tensions. The origins of
these tensions lie in the exclusion of major sectors of the
world’s population from the benefits of the new order, an
exclusion aggravated by population growth and by the
characteristics of the new world economy, for when factors
such as knowledge and technology come to outweigh
others, such as the availability of raw materials or low-cost
labour, the hopes of those who possess only an abundance
of the latter are increasingly disappointed, thus widening
and deepening the social gaps within and between
countries.
From a bitter past, Chile has learned the lesson of the
close relationship that exists between peace, democracy,
economic growth and social development. The central
objective of a security policy is the security of individuals
and of the communities in which they live. The
accentuation of inequality or exclusion is not only ethically
unacceptable, but also politically dangerous. No new
international order will be stable or lasting if it is based on
the exclusion of the majority of those who comprise it.
We are convinced that the absence of democracy and
the lack of economic growth centred on the human being
are at the root of the international instability that
characterizes our era. President Frei has spoken of a
"diplomacy for development", referring in these terms to
the necessity to adjust foreign policy to the objectives and
needs of each country and to the link that must necessarily
exist between our international action and our internal
objective of growth with equity. We therefore attach the
greatest importance to the Agenda for Development that is
under discussion in the United Nations.
This was the thinking behind the convening of the
World Summit for Social Development, unanimously
approved by the General Assembly. The analysis by Heads
of State and Government in Copenhagen next March should
lead us to a new policy to combat poverty, promote
employment and accelerate social integration. In particular,
we believe that the social Summit should adopt a common
commitment to eradicate extreme poverty in the world
through a concrete and efficient plan of action. What is
decided there will be intimately linked to the conditions of
security and coexistence in the emerging international
order.
The social Summit, together with the recent
Conference on Population and Development, held in
Cairo, the World Conference on Women, to be held in
Beijing in 1995, and the Secretary-General’s proposed
Agenda for Development, indicates the growing interest
that this Organization is taking in social issues.
Chile intends to comply with the agreements reached
at the Rio de Janeiro Summit and to promote a new
policy on environmental issues. In this context, its
National Congress recently approved the Convention on
Biological Diversity, and our ratification has just been
deposited with the United Nations. In turn, we are
convinced that environmental problems will remain
unresolved, and may even become exacerbated, if the
necessary resources are not available to deal with them
through joint action by developed and developing
countries. This is becoming increasingly apparent in
some developing countries, where poverty is accelerating
environmental deterioration as a result of the excessive
and uncontrolled use of certain resources.
The dual task of maintaining peace and at the same
time creating conditions for the elimination of structural
sources of conflict is an enormous challenge to this
Organization. Nevertheless, we are convinced that if we
do not take up the challenge we shall reach the beginning
of the next millennium without having laid the real
foundations for a new international order that will permit
the peaceful coexistence of mankind.
Taking up this challenge is not a task for the major
Powers alone, although their involvement is essential;
rather, it is a task for all nations capable of making a
contribution - especially the medium-sized countries,
which make up a large part of the international
community.
Chile is prepared to be a part of this effort, as are,
we are sure, all the countries of Latin America. The
central role of this Organization must be strengthened and
supported in the crucial years that lie ahead, for this is the
only way to ensure that the settlement of conflicts does
not alter international legality, that arbitrary intervention
is prevented and that the rights of the weakest are
respected.