For the people of Andorra, 2018 is a year of double celebration, globally and locally speaking. On 28 July, the Principality of Andorra celebrated 25 years since its entry into the United Nations, and on 10 December, it will be 70 years since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
As I have already mentioned, those two events have both a global and a local significance — what some people call “glocal”. In fact, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights has a global dimension for Andorra, as well as for the other countries that make up the international community. But it also has strong local roots, because fundamental rights have been respected in Andorra since time immemorial. It is therefore no wonder that the Andorran Constitution expressly states that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is in force in Andorra.
That is why our country wanted to play an active part in the Stand Up for Human Rights campaign, emphasizing the  importance  of  the  dissemination  of human rights in the area of education. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, with whom I have had the honour of working in the Ibero-American community in recent years, knows that she can count on Andorra to ensure that the Declaration made on 10 December 1948 remains as valid and as strong as ever. As I have already said, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was already part of Andorran positive law even before Andorra became a Member of the United Nations.
I would now like us to reflect on what the world was like 25 years ago, when Andorra joined the Organization as a full Member. The year 1993 was a time of hope for everyone. The fall of the Iron Curtain and the end of the Cold War gave way to a wave of unprecedented democratization. Never had so many people in the world lived under democracy as during the final years of the twentieth and the early years of the twenty-first century. Human rights were strengthened, economies grew and inequalities were gradually diminishing. They were years of peace, cooperation and multilateralism, as well as respect, understanding and dialogue among cultures and religions. Around us, on the old continent, they were years of optimism in the long and fruitful process of European construction.
Today, we all remember that period with a certain degree of nostalgia. We were reminded of that this summer during the meaningful homages paid to the former Secretary-General the late Kofi Annan, who did so much for peace and multilateralism throughout the end of the past century and the beginning of this millennium. We  saw it again just this week during the

Peace Summit dedicated to Nelson Mandela (see A/73/ PV.4 et seq.), who was, without a doubt, one of the key figures of that historic moment.
Twenty-five years on, many  of  the  hopes  of 1993  have  become  blurred  and,  despite some  of the milestones reached, we have slipped back. The prestigious non-governmental organization Freedom House has noted, year after year, a constant decline in world democracy since 2006. In its most recent report, we read that in 2017, only 4 of every 10 people live in free countries. That slow decline in democratic regimes has been accompanied by an increase in inequality, intolerance and extremism. Even in the most established democracies, we increasingly hear the voices of people who have suffered discrimination in silence for many years — women, persons with disabilities and victims of sexual abuse or abuse of any kind. All of that shows us that our optimism 25 years ago was rather naive.
However, despite all the disappointments and all the faults, we must still defend the international order that was created by the United Nations just after the end of the Second World War. We must defend that order because it is based on three principles that are  as elemental as they are universal. All of us have the same rights; what affects all of us must be decided by all of us; and any conflict must be solved peacefully and lawfully. When I say “all of us”,  I  am referring  to everybody, individually, within a representative democracy and to all countries, on an equal footing, here at the General Assembly.
Representative democracy and multilateralism share a set of common values and it is therefore not surprising that they should end up in crisis at the same time. In my  view,  the democratic multilateral order is threatened by the two extremes of populism and technocracy. In the face of complex problems, populism proposes solutions that are simple but that are not solutions, because they end up creating new problems and calling into question democratic principles and values. In the face of complex problems, technocracy proposes solutions that are as complex as they are elitist and that rather than being inclusive, generate inequality and bypass many people. Populism is fed by the disappointment of people who have been left to one side and have suffered from exclusion, a lack of understanding and inequality.
In recent years, we have heard time and time  again that the world is struggling between opening
up and closing down, between multilateralism and unilateralism, between cooperation and protectionism. But perhaps the mistake lies in wishing to present things in that way. All too often, defenders of the multilateral order and globalization believe that we have made no errors and that it is other people who are mistaken, without seeing that globalization has created antibodies, some harmful and some not — because perhaps not every kind of globalization is good.
In the face of that dialectic between opening up and closing down, we should not seek confrontation but look for balance. There should be a balance between cosmopolitanism and being deeply rooted in tradition, because there are advantages to both. All too often we have focused on the risks of protectionism, populism and closing down, without realizing that there is also another risk — that of elitist and inhumane globalization, which is not very inclusive, if at all. Very often the solutions that we have found to major international issues — whether geopolitical, economic or social — are solutions that do not consider people and that go against one of the themes of the United Nations, the call to leave no one behind.
I therefore view very positively the theme chosen by the President of the General Assembly, Ms. María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés — with whom we also share the Ibero-American community — of “Making the United Nations relevant to all people”. And that means building peaceful, equitable and sustainable societies.
The action of the United Nations, and by extension of the entire international community, must be inclusive and focused on the real problems of people. If we do not do that, we would be persevering in our mistakes; we would be reinforcing an image of international institutions that are difficult to understand and far removed from the concerns of the people, and we would be opening the door to populism even wider. That is why Andorra wants to participate in a particularly active way in promoting and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Goals are focused on the specific, tangible needs of the world population. They are major global objectives that have local applications and impact, and if they are attained, they will reinforce the bonds that are so necessary between people and institutions.
Andorra presented its first voluntary national review on the Sustainable Development Goals at the high- level political forum on sustainable development of the

Economic and Social Council last July. As explained in the review, our Government has been working for some time on classifying various of its political endeavours according to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda. We have also launched a campaign to involve the education community, civil society and private companies in promoting and achieving the various Goals. That is a way of opening up and bringing the United Nations and its agenda closer to the people.
In our opinion, innovation and the new technologies play a very important role in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. That is why we need a cross- cutting alliance between the public and the private sectors so that we can put technological progress in the service of the 2030 Agenda.
We have assessed our performance on six Sustainable Development Goals linked to the environment. They are water and sanitation; clean, accessible energy; sustainable cities; responsible consumption and production; the protection of life on Earth and the fight against climate change. Various actions introduced by my Government in recent years are aimed at those goals — the ongoing improvement of water and air quality; a comprehensive plan of energy transition that has enabled us to reduce our dependence on outside energy sources by promoting renewable energy; direct grants for renewing buildings using energy-efficient criteria and so on. All of those actions are designed to enable us to comply with the 2030 Agenda.
Andorra has also emphasized two more goals, measures to combat climate change and high-quality education, because they are two things with which Andorran society fully identifies. We therefore champion the validity of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, which many countries signed here in New York in April 2016, and we insist that the international community must comply with the agreements and commitments made in Paris in December 2015. We reiterated that view in Paris last December at the One Planet Summit, promoted by the Secretary-General and the President of the French Republic and Co-Prince  of  Andorra, Mr. Emmanuel Macron. Andorra is working to fulfil the commitments of the Paris Agreement and strongly encourages the rest of the international community to do the same.
As far as quality education is concerned, Andorra is proud of having a rich, diverse, all-embracing education
system that is available to all citizens. It is a system in which families can opt for Andorran, Spanish or French education at no additional cost. It prepares our young people to become citizens of a global world while remaining deeply rooted in their own identity.  That   is perhaps why a great many Andorran international cooperation efforts focus on the area of education. With the financial support of the Government, several Andorran non-governmental organizations are carrying out projects to  promote  training and  opportunities for street children in Bolivia, educate young girls in Honduras and provide  schooling  for  poor  children in Madagascar.
In choosing the theme for this session of the General Assembly — “Global leadership and shared responsibilities for peaceful, equitable and sustainable societies” — our President has spoken about leadership and shared responsibilities. That seems to me to be a key matter. If we allow the action of the United Nations, and by extension that of the entire international community, to move away from people’s real needs, we would be losing leadership.
In the face of the increase in populism and extremism, political leaders often feel they are misunderstood. However, misunderstood leaders do not exist, because a misunderstood leader is not a leader. A leader who does not connect with the people is not a leader. The United Nations cannot afford the luxury of disconnecting from the problems, needs, expectations and hopes of the citizens of this globalized world. Andorra therefore offers its support to the plans to reform the architecture of the United Nations that Secretary-General Guterres and his team are carrying out. More effective management of resources is essential, particularly with a management focused on people. That is crucial.
In this final part of my statement I would like to tell a personal anecdote. Seven and a half years ago, I took on the responsibility of leading the Government of the Principality of Andorra. The ballot boxes bestowed that responsibility on me again in March 2015. This will therefore be the last time that I address the General Assembly.
In Andorra, the entry  of  the  men  and  women  of my generation into political life  coincided  with  the approval of the 1993 Constitution and with the recognition of our country as a full member of the international community. I was elected a Member of

Parliament in the same year that Andorra became a part of the United Nations. I am therefore a child of that time of optimism that I mentioned at the beginning, a time when democracy was expanding, economies were growing, and multilateral institutions were becoming stronger. However, it was also up to me and the people of my generation to take on the responsibilities of Government in a time of crisis — economic crisis, social crisis and a crisis in values — at a time when what we believed to be solid and resistant was proving to be fragile and unstable.
Over time, we have grown accustomed to living with that awareness of fragility and instability. When all is said and done, maybe that is not so bad. Our predecessors, the previous generations of Andorrans, were acutely aware of the fragility of the foundations on which our very old institutions stood. If I compare that sense with the spirit of optimism that prevailed  25 years ago, the symbol of our times, the symbol of this current moment, is precisely that awareness of the fragility of the economy, the institutions, the worldwide geopolitical order, the environment and the planet as a whole. Everything seems to be much more fragile and in much greater danger now.
Moving from that awareness of fragility, we have found the strength to undertake actions that had been sitting on the table for years and to launch reforms that had been pending for decades — seeking a more open, transparent  and  cooperative  economy,  constructing a more inclusive and all-embracing society, finding sustainable models of growth and preserving the institutions and values that have been handed down through history, adapting them and making them useful for the people of today. Out of necessity we have made a virtue and out of weakness we have found strength so that the younger generations can take up the reins of their times and do so with the same optimism that we had 25 years ago. We must work right through to the last moment so that our disappointments can be transformed into their hope, so that our mistakes give rise to their ability to prevent them from  happening  again,  and so that our good choices serve as the foundations on which they can continue to build peaceful, equitable and sustainable societies.
All of us, the older and the younger generations, should always be aware that everything that happens in the global area has local repercussions and that all of the actions that we undertake at the local level contribute to shaping the global society. Hopefully, it is one that
is fairer in nature, a global society in which everybody feels that they are listened to and included. That is a global society to which Andorra — because of its small size, but also because of  its serenity, which prevails  as a result of centuries of peaceful existence — is  fully committed. The Secretary-General is aware of that, as are the President of the General Assembly at its seventy-third session and all our friends in the international community.
Politicians move on. Countries and institutions remain. I am sure that in the future Member States will be able to continue to count on the Principality of Andorra to assist in building a fairer, safer world. That is our task.


In February, President Espinosa Garcés presented her strategic vision for the seventy-third session of the General Assembly: “Dialogue and strengthening of multilateralism as a  catalyst  for  the  well-being  of all persons and a sustainable  planet”.  We  welcome her commitment to the theme “Making the United Nations relevant to all people: global leadership and shared responsibilities for peaceful, equitable and sustainable societies”.
The delegation of Monaco will support her so that, together, we can contribute to aligning our institutions with the Sustainable Development Goals to  ensure that the high-level political forum that we will hold here next year delivers  the  necessary  adjustments  for the full implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Dialogue and the promotion of multilateralism with a human face were also priorities of her predecessor, Mr. Miroslav Lajčák.  Under  his  presidency,  the work of the General Assembly at its seventy-second session facilitated the vital progress necessary for United Nations decisions to remain relevant. I would particularly like to emphasize the repositioning of the United Nations system for development as well as the global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration, which is to be formally adopted in Marrakech in December. We warmly thank him for having always listened to our representatives and for having prioritized the common interest, which is the guarantor for the success of multilateralism.
As the General Assembly commemorates the seventieth anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on 10 December, how can we not recall the fact that, as the Preamble to the Charter of the United Nations states, the reason that we, nations great and small, have committed to working together is “for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples”?
I would like to take this opportunity to thank President Bachelet for having rightly taken up the torch of Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein as United Nations High

Commissioner for Human Rights. We assure her of our support and congratulate Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein on never having avoided difficulties and on having assiduously championed the defence of human rights.
The United Nations and its Member States have continuously adapted to the new challenges posed by violence, conflict, transnational organized crime and the global scourge of terrorism. When the Security Council acts, it does so to ensure on behalf of all States international security and the protection of civilians. When the Council is prevented from acting, civilians, in particular women and children, pay an even higher price. In that regard, can we ignore the report of the Secretary-General (A/72/865), which notes in its paragraph 5 that in 2017, armed conflicts resulted in 6,000 proven cases of violations committed against children by Government forces and more than 15,000 by non-State armed groups? That is why Monaco supported the code of conduct regarding Security Council action against mass atrocity crimes at the seventieth session of the General Assembly.
In that spirit, we strongly condemn attacks against schools and hospitals, sexual violence and the denial of access to humanitarian aid. We firmly believe  in the role of women in peace processes. We support the involvement of young people in the prevention and resolution of conflicts. In that understanding, Monaco supports Security Council resolutions on such issues.
As the Monaco Red Cross celebrates its seventieth anniversary this year, I would like to recall the Principality’s commitment to strengthening respect for international humanitarian law. We also take this opportunity to pay tribute to all the men and women who have dedicated their lives to the Organization, tirelessly working to ensure that United Nations values prevail, and to the peacekeepers and United Nations officials who have died in the discharge of their mission.
Our country strongly supports the appointment by the Secretary-General of a Victims’ Rights Advocate, entrusted with placing rights and dignity at the heart of the Organization’s efforts and the zero-tolerance policy towards sexual harassment. We also hope that the principle of the responsibility to protect, contained in the 2005 World Summit Outcome (resolution 60/1), will at last be acknowledged and harnessed as a tool for progress accepted by all.
Since joining the United Nations, Monaco has significantly strengthened its legal arsenal. Over
the past 25 years, Monaco has ratified, adhered to or accepted more than 40 international treaties on human rights, refugees, privileges and immunities, criminal issues, disarmament, the environment and the law of the sea and has signed eight such treaties.
Even if today less than 10 per cent of the world’s population lives below the poverty line, the fact  is  that millions of human beings, including women and children, still live below that threshold and consequently are without access to education, health care, decent housing and work and opportunities for economic and social development.
In a world where artificial intelligence is developing and where genetic engineering and cyberspace are realities for many of us, how can we  disregard the fact that more than 68 million people were forcibly displaced in 2017 and that the United Nations has delivered assistance to a record number of 105 million people in 40 countries? Is it acceptable that three out of 10 people do not have access to safe drinking water and six out of 10 to sanitation? The Central Emergency Response Fund, to which the Principality contributes, has also funded emergency assistance in 36 countries to the tune of $418 million.
As we know, the many crises and challenges that  I have mentioned are interlinked. In that spirit, we adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (resolution 70/1). However, what is the paramount challenge facing our human societies today? It is clearly that of climate change. Its systemic effects spare no region of the world and equally are factors in the geopolitical upheaval that exacerbates the inequality and conflict that daily we strive to combat in this forum. Today, if we do not act ambitiously and effectively to combat that scourge, tomorrow we will have to be ready to live on a devastated planet, where it will be very difficult to maintain peace.
I  therefore endorse  the   Secretary-General’s call, issued earlier this month, to end the paralysis, indifference and weak commitments to the challenge of climate change. Today, the term “crisis” is nearly obsolete. As Mr. Guterres recalled, to prevent the worst, we must change course by 2020. That is why it is imperative that the negotiations of the twenty-fourth session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on  Climate Change, to be held in Katowice, result in the adoption of rules

allowing for the implementation of the Paris Agreement. For future generations, we must rise to that challenge.
Monaco is no exception to that framework. At the national level, the energy transition pact, launched at the beginning of the year, is ambitious and seeks to achieve the goal set by His Serene Highness Prince Albert II of achieving carbon neutrality by  2050  following  a 50 per cent reduction in greenhouse gases by 2030. That initiative represents a new concrete action by the Royal Government in order to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement. The pact is a partnership among all elements of society and demonstrates the will of the Sovereign Prince for Monaco to remain a land of innovation, all the more so if that is likely to accelerate the transition to a carbon-free world.
In that regard, we also welcomed with the keenest interest the Secretary-General’s intention to convene a climate summit in 2019. A few days before, Monaco will have hosted a meeting of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate  Change  with  a  view  to  issuing the special report on the ocean and cryosphere in a changing climate.
The maxim that there is no development without peace and no peace without development has continuously guided our work since the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. However, progress is uneven and sometimes too slow to ensure that all the goals and targets will be met by 2030. That necessary adaptation to the challenges of  implementing the 2030  Agenda is an important step towards initiating a paradigm shift that will bring more coherence, efficiency and visibility to the work of our Organization, even though it is of course the primary duty of each Member State to remain mobilized.
In that regard, Monaco also prioritizes partnerships in its international cooperation given the long-standing evidence. We can achieve our united actions only by leveraging best practices and by constantly reviewing the technical opportunities based on our past experience.
Our cooperation with local non-governmental organizations in partner countries is based on trust and human involvement. The size  of  our  territory has naturally led us to look towards others. Trust in the links established with Monaco’s 11 international cooperation partnership countries makes  it  possible to support exclusively through grants more than 130 projects a year in priority sectors, namely, education, health,  food  security and socioeconomic integration.
The Principality remains a committed and resolute partner in doing its part to make the new paradigm of sustainable development a reality for all.
Our faith in multilateralism is anchored in the reality of a world of evolving threats. The Principality of Monaco shoulders its responsibility by implementing the principle of one State, one vote enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations. Monaco is convinced that the United Nations alone remains a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations towards shared goals. The authors of the Charter were visionaries. Like them, we must constantly renew our commitment to saving succeeding generations from the scourge of war.
In conclusion, allow me to quote Seneca, who  said: “It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.” Given the proliferation of challenges, let us dare to stand closer together. Even if not everything will be resolved in an easily measurable time frame, let us promote understanding among people and respect for our differences. I would be remiss if I did not reiterate our full trust in Mr. António Guterres and his transformative initiatives, which will make the United Nations better suited and more likely to effectively and efficiently meet the challenges of tomorrow.


It is a great honour for me to represent the Kingdom of Thailand in the Assembly of the nations of  the world. Allow me, at  the outset, to express our deepest condolences to the Government and the people of Viet Nam on the passing of President Trần Đại Quang. His dedication to Viet Nam and his contributions to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) will always be remembered with respect. I would also like to express our heartfelt sympathy to and solidarity with the Government and the people of Indonesia for the terrible loss of lives  and the injuries and damage following the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami that hit the island of Sulawesi this past week. I also join others in paying tribute to the memory of the late former Secretary-General Kofi Annan. His efforts to incorporate human rights into the work of all United Nations organs has brought the

United Nations closer to the people. He will be long remembered as the Secretary-General who tried to make the world more humane.
We are living in a world characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. The United Nations needs to adapt to meet the challenges of that environment, so that it can fulfil its noble mission of peace and security, development and human rights. Thailand therefore supports the efforts of Secretary- General Guterres to reform the United Nations system so as to make it more effective, efficient and human- centred. Thailand has been active in translating the principles enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations into practices aimed at  promoting  peace  and security, fostering sustainable development and safeguarding human rights.
On peace and security, Thailand supports efforts to make the Security Council more representative, more inclusive and more democratic. We support the Secretary-General’s commitment to forge stronger linkages between peace, security and sustainable development, as we believe that it is indeed the economic and social development of the communities and the people that lies at the centre of sustaining peace. Since 1950, over 27,000 Thai military and police personnel, men and women, have proudly served in more than 20 United Nations peacekeeping and related missions. And we will do more. In addition to a number of military and police officers who are currently stationed with three peacekeeping missions, we are getting ready to deploy a horizontal military engineering company to join the United Nations Mission in South Sudan. Wherever Thai peacekeepers go, they simultaneously seek to keep peace and foster sustainable development and to engage in both peacekeeping and peacebuilding.
Thailand also supports a rules-based international order. Last year, Thailand became one of the first States to sign and ratify the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. And just this past week, I deposited our instrument of ratification for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), which complements ASEAN’s objective of making South-East Asia a nuclear- weapon-free zone. We also support efforts to achieve a peaceful and denuclearized Korean peninsula. We hope, furthermore, to see one day a nuclear-weapon-free Indo-Pacific region. The late United States Senator from New York, Robert Kennedy, paraphrasing George Bernard Shaw, once said, “Some [men] see things as they are, and [ask] ‘why?’ I dream [of] things that never
were and [ask], ‘Why not?’”. Today all 10 South-East Asian nations have ratified the CTBT — why have the countries in the Indo-Pacific region not all done so? As an Asian proverb states, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. South-East Asia has taken that first step towards a nuclear-weapon-free region. Why have the rest of the Indo-Pacific countries not all done so?
On development, Thailand supports the reform of the United Nations development system with a view to making it more effective, efficient and people-centred. We are also reforming our whole country as we implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Committing ourselves to realizing the SDGs is one thing, but implementing them locally is another. That is why the Thai Government strives to empower our local communities, in urban and rural areas, to change for the better, to improve the way we produce and consume, the way we work and travel, and the way we live, in order to achieve sustainability and realize the SDGs. As Mahatma Gandhi once said, we must be the change that we wish to see in the world. Sustainable development can be achieved only when it is inclusive and responds to the needs of people in the society concerned. In Thailand, we have launched our reforms based on what we have called the “pracharat principle” or the public-private-people partnership. Under that principle, the people, the Government and the private sector work closely together to pursue sustainable development. We are applying that holistic approach, uniting all three sectors ─ public, private and people ─ so as to ensure that all stakeholders are engaged in the country’s development efforts, leaving no one behind.
In realizing Sustainable Development Goal 14 on the conservation and sustainable use of the oceans, seas and marine resources, Thailand is the first Asian country to join a global initiative to clean up the oceans around our tourist hotspots, such as Koh Samui, Koh Tao and the famous Phuket. We are also working on raising public awareness of climate change. We are also cooperating with other countries in the region to mitigate the risks of natural disasters, such as the one that just hit Indonesia. Last year, in order to mitigate the human-caused disaster of pollution, in particular in the form of plastic garbage in the seas and oceans, Thailand hosted the ASEAN Conference on Reducing Marine Debris in the ASEAN Region aimed at pooling our efforts to clean the seas in our region. Thailand also hosted the ASEAN-China Workshop on Marine

Environmental Protection in the South China Sea, which sought to map a strategy to clean up our regional seas. In those efforts, we are mindful of the warning that marine biologist Rachel Carson gave in her book The Sea Around Us, writing that it is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first arose, should now be threatened by the activities of one form of that life. But the sea, though changed in a sinister way, will continue to exist; the threat is rather to life itself. When we seek to save the seas and the oceans, we are in fact seeking to save humankind.
On human rights, we are finalizing the draft of our fourth national human rights plan for the period 2019- 2023, which seeks to address a range of human rights challenges, including issues such as access to land and natural resources, the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex persons and human rights defenders, and the freedom of the press. We are also drafting a national action plan on business and human rights so as to make our private sector an indispensable partner in mainstreaming human rights into all sectors of Thai society.
The Thai Government’s policies seek to address human rights challenges in a  structural manner and to lay the foundation for sustainable democracy in Thailand. In order to address discrimination and protect people in vulnerable situations, we have enacted the Gender Equality Act, various acts to protect vulnerable persons, the Justice Fund Act and the Equitable Education Fund Act. A number of new laws are also in the pipeline, such as a community forest bill that seeks to promote people’s participation in natural resource management, a bill on community banks, a land-tax bill to reduce the gap between the rich and the poor, and a bill for the prevention and elimination of forced labour aimed at protecting the rights of workers and at tackling trafficking in  persons.  Thailand  recently  ratified the International Labour Organization’s Protocol to Convention No. 29, on forced labour, as a part of our continued effort to improve Thai labour standards.
The Thai Government firmly believes that engagement with civil society is key to an inclusive approach to human rights and sustainable development. Our relevant agencies have been holding periodic consultations with non-governmental organizations working on sustainable development and human rights issues, including in our voluntary national review on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and our national presentations to human rights treaty bodies.
Our commitment to the three pillars of the United Nations, namely, peace and security, development and human rights, has contributed positively to the stability and prosperity of the Kingdom  of  Thailand.  Since the current Government assumed office four years ago, the rate of growth of Thailand’s gross domestic product (GDP) has risen from 0.9 per cent in 2014 to
3.9 per cent. This year, our GDP is expected to grow by between 4.4 and 4.9 per cent. National competitiveness has risen from thirty-seventh place in 2014 to thirty- second place last year. Tourists have returned, with more than 35 million visitors to Thailand last year. This year, the number of tourists coming to Thailand is expected to be close to 40 million, thereby reflecting tourists’ confidence in Thailand’s peace and security.
Our efforts to realize the SDGs have also improved our people’s lives. The maternal mortality ratio stands at 26.6 deaths per 100,000 live births, and the mortality rate of children under 5 is at 8.6 per 1,000 live births. People’s   access  to  universal  health  care  stands   at
99.9 per cent. Access to education at the  primary  level  is  at  100  per  cent,  lower  secondary  school at
88.3 per cent and upper secondary school at 72.7 per cent. Furthermore, 60 per cent of our labour force are women. In our efforts to realize the SDGs, the Royal Thai Government has been guided by  His  Majesty the late King Bhumibol Adulyadej’s sufficiency economy philosophy.
The sufficiency economy philosophy teaches us that development must be home-grown and rooted within each citizen in order to be sustainable — in other words, strength from within builds strength on the outside. The Government has therefore focused our resources so as to empower households and communities through our policies with regard to community banking, community land deeds, community forests, lifting household debts and providing universal health coverage.  Thailand  has also shared our philosophy of development, the sufficiency economy philosophy, with the Group of  77 and China, which has endorsed it as a development model. We have also been working with over twenty countries around the world under the Sufficiency Economy Philosophy for SDGs Partnership, sharing our developmental approach.
Looking ahead, the Royal Thai Government is laying a strong foundation for stability and development through its twenty-year national strategies. They will transform our country into a strong and modern economy that is ready to cope with the present-day volatile,

uncertain, complex and ambiguous environment and the challenges that we will face throughout the remainder of the twenty-first century.
Thailand was the birthplace of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). In 2019, Thailand will assume the chairmanship of ASEAN. Our goal during our chairmanship of ASEAN is to foster the creation of a truly people-centred community, where no one is left behind. Such a community will need to be resilient, dynamic, inclusive and forward-looking. During our chairmanship of ASEAN, we will further strengthen our partnership with the United Nations on its three noble missions: peace and security, sustainable development and human rights.
In our partnership with the United Nations on sustainable development, we believe that the Economic and Social Council can help shape directions  and build policy coherence to support us in realizing the SDGs. Thailand will therefore seek membership in the Council for the term 2020-2022. We will try our utmost to support the Council in advancing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
I am also glad to announce that, in order to reaffirm our support for the repositioning of the United Nations development system, Thailand will contribute $200,000 to the special purpose trust fund to reinvigorate the resident coordinator system. That will enhance the work of the United Nations on the ground and make the Organization more relevant to all people.
As a small country, Thailand takes to heart the conviction of the late former Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld that, ultimately, international law  is the last defence of small countries. Thailand views the United Nations as an embodiment of international law in action and therefore pledges our full and wholehearted cooperation with the United Nations.


It is a great honour and privilege for me to address the Assembly for the first time at the beginning of my tenure as President of the Republic of Paraguay.
Paraguay has always shown its unconditional support for the United Nations system and will continue to unwaveringly assume its commitments as a Member of the Organization, as well as its active responsibility based on the principles that we all recognize — freedom, justice, national sovereignty, independence and the integrity of States. My nation has a deep sense of equality based on the recognition of human dignity. We reject violence and intolerance and love peace. Ours is a society of diverse cultures. It is bilingual, capable of overcoming difficulties selflessly and responsibly, which requires integrity and righteousness, the civic values intrinsic to democracy.
We are very pleased that the most democratic and representative body of our Organization is being led by a woman who is also Latin American. We offer our congratulations and best wishes for success to the new President of the General Assembly, Ms. María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés. We also salute Secretary-General António Guterres, who is doing an excellent job leading the institution. We reiterate our absolute confidence in and support for his management.
We offer our posthumous tribute to the former Secretary-General and Nobel Peace Prize  laureate  the late Kofi Annan. He was an extraordinary leader, humanist and promoter of peace who took pains to ensure that the Organization serves the peoples as well as the States.
In an increasingly interconnected and interdependent world that is evolving at an accelerated pace,  collectively addressing  global  challenges  is an unavoidable responsibility of the international community. The General Assembly must continue to be strengthened, as it is the voice of the nations of the world. The Security Council must be reformed with a view to making it more democratic and inclusive so as to fulfil the mandate of maintaining international peace and security for this and future generations. Paraguay advocates adding more developing countries so as to balance the membership of the Council, as well as totally eliminating the veto, a privilege that no longer corresponds to the political reality of our times.
The Republic of Paraguay has strongly supported the reforms promoted by  the  Secretary-General  in the pillars of development, peace and security, and management. We believe that those efforts have been successful and that they have been deployed at the right time, since in order to face the challenges posed by sustainable development, we must have an efficient, transparent Organization that has the capacity to support countries in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, particularly countries with special needs and challenges, such as landlocked developing countries.
The poverty that is  currently affecting  millions of human beings is due to the poor distribution of goods rather than their scarcity. As leaders it is our responsibility to stop viewing poverty simply as an economic indicator and instead to see it as a human problem. In our view, ignoring the human aspect when we speak about poverty is going against the principles that this institution and our democracies represent.
Our Government is committed to making social policies more far-reaching and intensifying our support to human development by improving the democratization of access to education, health care and dignified employment. That is the way forward, in both the medium and long terms, to achieving greater social equity and collective prosperity. We are especially focusing on young people, who have extraordinary

potential to help transform Paraguay and the world. We must take advantage of the opportunity that demography has given us to lay solid foundations for a better future. With that purpose in mind, we are initiating a process for the profound transformation of our education policies that will enable us to bring children and young people into the education system, with a special emphasis on training teachers and professors.
We are going to install and consolidate a social protection system that addresses people’s entire lives. Paraguay must protect its people from conception to old age. There are many pending issues in the situation of people with disabilities and this is a key moment for Paraguay as a nation to promote their rights. We will give particular attention to ensuring that our public policies are cross-cutting so that we can implement them fully. We are also working to promote women as a factor for change in our country, creating the conditions necessary for equity, equality and empowerment. With the support of our mothers, wives and daughters, we firmly believe that we can create a better country and society. And our indigenous peoples occupy a special place in our Government. It is time for the State to shoulder the task of creating better living conditions for them. That is a moral obligation.
Paraguay is deeply concerned about the  scourge of terrorism and believes that there can never be any justification for the use  of  violence  as  a  means  to an end. We condemn terrorism in all its forms and manifestations and reaffirm that the fight against terrorism and the protection of human rights are not opposing goals but rather complement and mutually reinforce one another. We continue to work relentlessly with allied countries to fiercely fight every form of crime. We cannot accept the possibility that our borders can become places where criminal organizations can thrive. In the few weeks since my presidential term began, we have carried out some operations that have produced very positive results in the fight  against drug trafficking and have shown through our political will that we are determined not  to  give  up  under  any circumstances.  International   drug  trafficking is accustomed to believing itself untouchable and is constantly seeking power. I have promised my people, and today I pledge it before the entire international community, that we will not allow that to happen. We will continue fighting and working alongside every State to eradicate these criminal networks.
As a priority,  climate  change  is  unquestionably a global challenge. We States have a  crucial decision in our hands — we can slow climate change and deal with its consequences, or deny it and continue making it worse. With its adoption of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change in 2015, the international community decided to work together to combat climate change, without ignoring the historical responsibility that the most highly developed nations have for the production of greenhouse gases. The issue of environmental responsibility is shaping Paraguay’s vision for strategic development. We generate more renewable energy per capita than any other country on the planet, and we are also a major exporter of that energy. At the same time, we also intend to expand and improve our national and regional power systems.
Democracy has been consolidated in many countries, but we have the obligation to adequately address the demands of a people who are impatient with institutions whose legitimacy has been  jeopardized by corruption, inequality and inefficiency in the face of urgent need. The citizens of Paraguay — indeed, the citizens of the world — have woken up. Their voices resound in our streets, calling for us to tackle corruption and impunity, and it is our obligation to listen to them and not ignore their just demands. In my country, we understand that dialogue and convergence are fundamental tools for major reform of the judicial system, which is a priority for us. Judicial security and the efficacy of justice are a nation’s pillars. Without justice there can be no order, and without order chaos reigns, and in chaos there can be no peace or social development. I firmly believe in our institutions and in the importance of reforming and strengthening them so that they respond to our societies’ current and future needs. Only with strong institutions and systems can we ensure the growth of our democracies.
Paraguay is one of the most open economies in the world. We understand that interaction with the world  is an essential element for development. We consider alliances to be an essential way of improving global integration. Our country is firmly committed to full regional integration and aspires to build it in full respect for the sovereignty and independence of each of the Latin American and Caribbean peoples. But we cannot ignore the fact that dictatorial regimes that rob their own populations of their happiness, hopes, dreams and human rights persist on our continent. We want to express our solidarity with the peoples of Venezuela

and Nicaragua in the face of the abuses of power in their countries. We firmly believe that despite our differences, our region must work together to create the wealth and share the prosperity that will benefit our peoples. The pursuit of ideologies as an act of fanaticism or a way to assert superiority must be eradicated. Our goal should be to work for the greater good, while respecting our differences, and for the benefit of our communities.
Every country faces individual challenges on its path to sustainable development, but the international community has acknowledged that the most vulnerable countries — including landlocked developing countries, whose geography creates special needs and challenges — require special attention. Those needs and challenges make themselves felt mainly in the area of trade. Paraguay has chaired the Group of Landlocked Developing Countries for two years and has made a priority of the implementation of the Vienna Programme of Action for Landlocked Developing  Countries for the Decade 2014-2024, which is an integral part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and urges States, particularly our trading partners and countries of transit, to take the  Programme  of  Action  into  due consideration.
We believe that the Arms Trade Treaty and the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons represent major steps towards disarmament and non-proliferation. The Republic of Paraguay reaffirms its commitment to peacekeeping operations under  the  auspices  of  the United Nations, in  its  belief  in  the  importance of contributing to the achievement of the  purposes and principles enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations. Paraguayan military and police personnel, duly trained prior to deployment, are currently serving in various United Nations peacekeeping missions around the world.
Paraguay respects international law. All of my Government’s decisions are based on its principles, and we faithfully implement all General Assembly and Security Council resolutions. My country supports Taiwan’s legitimate request to be included in the United Nations system and believes that Taiwan can make a major contribution to our work. This is all based on the principle of universality that characterizes our Organization.
This year, we will adopt two historic agreements, the global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration and the global compact on refugees. Paraguay
has actively participated in the negotiations on both documents, which seek to reach agreements that benefit refugees and migrants equally, as well as the countries and communities from which they come, through which they transit and to which they go.
In 1958, Paraguay launched the World Friendship Crusade, an endeavour that has deeply moved our people. In May 2011, the General Assembly decided to support that initiative by declaring 30 July as the International Day of Friendship.  I  urge  the  leaders of all Member States of the Organization to promote friendship as a noble and valuable sentiment in the lives of human beings.
This year marks the seventieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a milestone in the history of humankind that enabled us to recognize formally and for the first time that all people have fundamental rights by virtue of their human condition, without distinction based on race, sex, nationality, religion or any other condition. Paraguay reaffirms its commitment to the Declaration and emphasizes that the United Nations must continue to play a fundamental role in ensuring the full enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms for all.
The adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development was an enormously important commitment. It represents the beginning of a process of restructuring aimed at transforming the growth paradigms of today’s generations and ensuring the well- being of those of the future. The success of that new global agenda depends on the commitment of States and on international solidarity. We therefore call for that global partnership to mobilize the resources necessary for its full implementation, including technology transfers, knowledge-sharing and capacity-building, particularly as they  relate  to  developing  countries. In fulfilment of the commitment Paraguay made on  25 September 2015, we presented our first voluntary national review of the progress we have made in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda at the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development in July.
In the face of an international scenario characterized by political uncertainty and economic volatility, we need collective and comprehensive strategies with a sense of shared responsibility. That is why it is vital that we decide whether we can allow States to impose themselves and obtain the greatest advantage they can from their position, or whether we should work actively

for stability and common peace by strengthening multilateral instruments  and mutual cooperation. The United Nations Organization is a continuing work-in-progress. We must all maintain a constant and unalterable commitment to working on strengthening it and building its capacity to adapt and respond to the common challenges facing humankind. May God bless our nations.


We live  in  times of great opportunities and serious challenges. We are more interconnected than ever, yet the world remains divided in many ways. Technological developments have enabled our world to become a truly global village. Our citizens have become global citizens and are well- informed and strongly driven by developments around the world. They expect global leadership in these times of rapid change and great complexity and look to all of us for inspiration.
What is it that people are looking for today? What is it that they expect of a leader? Mighty words? These do not really matter much anymore. Mighty deeds? Yes indeed, but, foremost, what they expect of us are the simplest of gestures that bring us together and that show our compassion and respect for each other. They expect integrity and inspiration.

This summer, football — of all things — triggered a global response, uniting us for a moment in our common aspirations to excellence. Following the success of the Croatian national team, I received so many congratulatory letters and messages from all corners of the world — from China, Australia and Saudi Arabia to France, Trinidad and Tobago and Nepal. I thank everyone for their kind words. Vishal Bagale of India kindly said, “Team Croatia really played well. They won our hearts”. Shabbir Allam wrote in Croatian “Svi kao jedno” — “We are all like one”. Gilberto Castillo of Colombia pointed out that the final was
“well-deserved for a country  that  has  excelled  in spite of the harsh historic situations it has experienced. It is certainly an example to follow”.
Opshori Nondona, a 14-year-old girl from Dhaka, Bangladesh, was especially persistent in getting her message through. She wrote:
“This year, the whole world has recognized a small beautiful country — Croatia — and the power of football. Now the world knows how powerful a small, beautiful nation can be.”
These messages are but a fraction of many. What most of them had in common and what I could read in each of them is that Croatia — not a large country in terms of the size of its territory, its population or even its economic means — has become a metaphor, for all of these kind people who congratulated us, for what a country can do to inspire others and to reach the top of the world, winning the hearts of people worldwide and rousing enthusiasm that each of their countries can do the same.
“The value of a nation is not measured by its size”, underlined Bernard Stem of France. Indeed, one does not need physical size in order to excel; it takes heart and persistence. Above all, you need to share a vision and to work together to make it happen. It is not the size of one’s territory that matters; it is the size and quality of one’s ideas. Magnitude is measured not only in volume, but even more so in determination to reach the goal. Individual Croatian players might have shown great skill and technique on the field, but the reason they triumphed was because they played  together as   a team.
The United Nations is a place where we must show our willingness to act together  and  play  together  as a team. Our adversaries are many: poverty; hunger; terrorism and extremism; instability; lack of education; gender inequality and the exclusion of women in many societies; environmental hazards; endangered security and trampled human dignity. We leaders should think of ourselves as a team that needs to work together to take advantage of our strengths and address our weaknesses in order to make our world a better place and inspire excellence globally. We should lead not only in managing crises and solving problems, but in spreading hope and optimism as well. We must demonstrate our humanity, solidarity and compassion and in doing so, we must above all respect one another. Respect is the most valuable asset that we have in interpersonal and international relations.
It is our responsibility as States Members of the United Nations to maintain the relevance, effectiveness and efficiency of our Organization and to be  up  to  the task for whatever challenges may confront us. However, raising awareness of the most pressing issues is not enough. We must  also  push  for  the  adoption of the instruments and  frameworks  necessary  to deal with them and, most importantly, secure their implementation. Without that, this rostrum will remain a self-serving global stage, just words without deeds.
Through the years, we have often learned the hard way that Governments and international organizations alike have their limits. This has also taught us the value and importance of inclusiveness and the  important role that the private sector, academia, civil society and brilliant individuals can play in many different fields. Croatia has many Luka Modrićs, and not only in sports. Our people excel in so many areas. Marin Soljačić is a modern-day Nikola Tesla who is developing a wireless transfer of energy, Iva Tolić is conducting breakthrough work in molecular cell biology, Ivan Mrvoš is a developer of smart city furniture for the cities of the future and Mate Rimac is building electric cars, to name just a few among countless others.
So let us push against the formal limits of our organizations. Let us embrace the abundant talent around us. Let us inspire through science and innovation, through our brilliant individuals at home and our well- established, hard-working diaspora around the world. Let us inspire through our dedicated and tireless work at the United Nations. Deeds, not words; inclusion, not

exclusion or isolation; empowerment and motivation are the keys to success.
We are the global village, but more often than not we tend to miss opportunities to bring the global agenda to our homes, communities and families. We also forget to include our homes, communities and families on the global agenda. It takes great tragedies caused by disasters, global crises, wars or climate change to remind us of what we all stand to lose. In today’s world, that approach, embodied in multilateralism, is under ever-increasing strain. This is of particular concern, since the most important issues for humankind cannot be resolved by any State single-handedly or in isolation. Multilateralism is indispensable, but I would agree with those who call for changes to the multilateral system that we should not be complacent. We need to rethink decades-old mechanisms and instruments in order to adapt them to modern times and contemporary needs.
As we celebrate two very important anniversaries this year — the 70 years of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the 25 years of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action — it is a fitting time to remember that respect for human rights, democracy and the rule of law has always  been a  precondition for long-term stability, peace and development. Nor should we forget the seventieth anniversary of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. We must learn from the tragedies of Srebrenica and Rwanda — “a shame for the United Nations”, as described by the great Secretary-General Kofi Annan, to whom I pay special tribute today. Those dark hours must never be forgotten.
This year Croatia marked its fifth year of membership in the European Union (EU). Croatia  is  a telling example of the transformative force of EU membership and the benefits of accession to a space where peace, freedom, human dignity and prosperity are standards, not mere ideals. For those reasons, among others, Croatia strongly supports further EU enlargement to our south-eastern neighbourhood. Resolving all the outstanding legacies of war while constructively engaging in regional cooperation and good-neighbourly relations is of course essential. Within that framework we will maintain a particular focus on issues related to the rights of minorities, missing persons, war crimes jurisdiction, victims of war and domestic processing of war crimes.
Good and mutually beneficial neighbourly relations depend to a large degree on the words coming from across the border, because  it  takes  only  a  moment to deliver inflammatory and revisionist rhetoric in response to domestic political circumstances. However, repairing the damage caused takes much, much longer. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, our closest neighbour and a country that is extremely important to Croatia, we see a potential risk of legal uncertainty and political and institutional instability in the wake of the upcoming October elections, owing to a failure to amend the electoral framework so that it fully respects the rights and equality of Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs, the three constituent peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina, in line with the Constitutional Court’s decision on the legitimate and proportionate representation of constituent peoples at all levels of Government, including the presidency. And although it is for the two sides involved to resolve the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, we should be extremely cautious when it comes to proposals with potential regional implications, notably on ideas regarding territorial exchanges. Otherwise we could reopen a Pandora’s box of potential new territorial claims that would provoke serious instability and security threats.
There are inspiring developments, however, that have also demonstrated brave leadership in our own region of South-East Europe. We warmly welcome the signing of the agreement reached on the name dispute between Skopje and Athens, and we hope that the referendum this coming Sunday will represent a crucial impetus for the country’s successful continuation of its path of integration into Europe.
By adopting the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, along with the historic Paris Agreement on Climate Change and the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, we have sent a powerful message that there is hope for a brighter future. However, if we are to succeed in our endeavours, we have to mobilize all partners to work together. In that way we can achieve social progress, protect the environment, create economic growth and build a more just, stable and peaceful world. Runaway climate change is one of  the  most  serious  threats that we are regularly witnessing — from heatwaves and forest fires, no longer limited  to  California  or the Mediterranean but now also in places such as Scandinavia, to historic typhoons in Japan or the Philippines and to the melting of the ice sheets on the planet’s poles.

No country can shield itself from the negative effects of climate change, and Croatia is no exception. With more than 1,000 islands, islets and reefs, and a rich history of Mediterranean heritage, the implementation of the goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development right now is crucial to Croatia’s future. All over the world, including Croatia, we are seeing rises in sea temperatures and unprecedented and irreversible changes in ecosystems. In Croatia’s beautiful Adriatic Sea, one of the cleanest in the world, we have already registered more than 20 new species of tropical fish, some of them extremely invasive, that could irreparably shift its environmental balance. We may soon be exposed to the danger of rising sea levels, which is already an existential issue for many small islands around the world. It is estimated that the sea level in the Adriatic will rise by almost half a metre by the year 2100, submerging parts of world heritage places and treasures such as Split, Trogir and Dubrovnik. That is why climate action is not an abstract issue. It is a serious matter requiring our constant and undivided attention.
One of the most important climate-action and sustainable-development issues for Croatia is reversing the demographic trends on our islands, which are turning into places where schools have no children and churches see more funerals than baptisms and weddings. And yet the problems that many of these islands are facing are common all over the world. We need to improve affordable transportation and connections between the islands and the mainland. We need to resolve our water- supply issues and provide clean water and sanitation. We need to invest in education, technology, science and innovation so that societies and families can once again flourish on the islands.
Blue growth could be a solution. It is a long-term strategy to support sustainable growth in the marine and maritime sectors as a whole. The seas are drivers of the economy, with great potential for innovation and growth, and they are set to grow at twice the rate of the mainstream  economy  by  2030.  That  growth is especially welcome in a number of areas such as sustainable coastal tourism, new health  benefits, better connectivity for islands, sustainable blue growth and jobs, marine technology, renewable energy, the management of maritime ecological threats and the preservation of ecosystems and biodiversity, as well as improving safety and security with regard to maritime traffic and cross-border maritime pollution.
One of the issues that I  would  particularly like  to emphasize today is marine litter, an increasingly worrying problem that threatens marine life in all of the world’s oceans and affects more than 600 marine species. Croatia’s coastal areas are being severely affected by poorly managed waste from our southern Adriatic neighbours. We have to address the rising problem of plastic pollution in our seas and oceans urgently if we want to leave a liveable world for future generations. Plastic debris — and each year around 8 million tons of it ends up in our oceans and seas — is particularly worrying because it is resistant to environmental breakdown. Plastic pollution not only harms sea life,  it also carries toxic pollutants into the food chain, with us humans at the top. We can start solving this problem by educating and engaging everyone in a conversation to rethink plastic, by challenging society’s perception that  this  indestructible  substance  can  be  treated  as disposable.
In that regard, particular attention should be given to the Ocean Cleanup project, which is designing and developing the first feasible method to rid the world’s oceans of plastic. Its first mission, to remove 50 per cent of the so-called great Pacific garbage patch in just five years, started several weeks ago. In the media they are calling it Pac-Man, in a reference to the popular early video game. Boyan Slat, the young man behind the invention, is a brilliant scientist of Croatian origin, living in the Netherlands, and he fully deserves to be given credit here today, beneath the United Nations logo, which clearly  shows  our  oceans.  My  country is already actively preparing for the fulfilment of its obligations under the Paris Agreement.
This year was  one  of  United  Nations  reforms  in more ways than one — not only through results achieved in the pivotal sectors of peace and security, development and United Nations management, but also in the transformational nature of our mutual efforts to make our Organization fit for the twenty-first century. The world has changed profoundly  since  1945  and the birth of the United Nations. In our reforms, it is essential that we strike the right balance between the maintenance of the basic framework based on the Charter of the United Nations and the flexibility that our new realities and contemporary  needs  demand. In pursuing United Nations reforms, we must not lose sight of the 2030 Agenda. We need a United Nations that is capable of coping with constant changes and growing challenges in the international arena, whether

in the field of regional security, conflict management, threats to the environment, human rights or front-line technologies that are fundamentally transforming the areas of labour and disarmament alike.
I want to take this opportunity to commend the Secretary-General and his team for their tireless efforts to achieve reform. There is still a lot of work ahead of us, but we should be pleased with this year’s results and trends. If we want to move forward and leave no one behind; if we truly strive to make the United Nations more relevant and, in doing so, more effective, we must also realize that the Organization is and should be much more than just New York, Geneva, Vienna, Nairobi or any other conference location. Multilateralism starts in our own homes and our own minds. It cannot be an annual event. It needs to be our daily routine, a way of doing business in the world. Everything that we want to achieve globally and everything that we have agreed to so far under this dome will be easier to accomplish with the understanding and support of our citizens.
In order to confront all the adversities and adversaries mentioned in my speech, both as I have delivered it and in the more complete, written version that has been circulated, we must show our determination to take on the risk of decision-making. We must be open to new ideas and we must show emotion, empathy and above all enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is contagious. As Nelson Mandela — Madiba — whose centenary  we celebrated two days ago, may have said, “It always seems impossible until it’s done.”