Debate: th and th sessions of the United Nations General Assembly
Date: TUESDAY, 8 JUNE 2021
Speaker: Josep Borrell Fontelles
Language: EN

En febrero de este año, junto con la Comisión, presenté una Comunicación conjunta que demuestra el compromiso de la Unión Europea con el multilateralismo, presenta un análisis de cómo podemos, desde la Unión Europea, contribuir a un orden global basado en reglas comunes y actualiza nuestra visión teniendo en cuenta la magnitud de los grandes problemas globales a los que hacemos frente, además en un contexto geopolítico más difícil. This dated policy was born out of our conviction that the values-based and rules—based multilateralism is absolutely necessary if we want to effectively confront global challenges, as I said, let it be pandemics or climate change or terrorism. It’s also clear that the stronger European Union both strengthens this multilateral system and serves our own interests. I am happy to see that your draft report reinforces these key messages and the messages of our joint communication and that our political priorities are fully in synchronisation in general and regarding the priorities of the United Nations General Assembly. Your report underlines the need for multilateral cooperation centred on the United Nations and the importance of upholding human rights, universal values and the rule of law, which underpin the multilateral system. Those values lie at the centre of the European Union’s external action and our work across the United Nations system, from the general system and the Human Rights Council to the Security Council and the Peacebuilding Commission, as well as the many specialised United Nations agencies and programmes which are so often vital for the European Union in norm settings and project implementation. On 10 June, I will speak up for those values and for the need for multilateralism in my annual address to the United Nations Security Council. As you know, the High Representative represents the European Union in front of the international bodies and in particular in front of the UN Security Council, and it is my privilege to address this body. And in this address, I will call for a Security Council that fulfils its responsibility to address conflict, protect civilians and uphold international law effectively. The emphasis that you put on partnerships is also very welcome. We must be ambitious and broad in our partnership, including also countries that, despite our very differing views in important areas, we need to be on board to fight, for example, climate change and to bring peace and stability to certain regions. The fact that we don’t share the same political system with many different countries in the world should not prevent us from partnership with them in order to face our common challenges. And from this point of view, we have to celebrate the re-engagement of the US in multilateral organisations. I welcome very much this re-engagement. We are working to rebuild our historical good cooperation with the US and to strengthen our cooperation with other like-minded partners. And soon we are going to have a summit meeting with the new US administration, and I think that is going to be also a landmark of this re-engagement with the US, because only through collective efforts and leadership can we defend the multilateral order against some actors’ attempts to undermine the basic principles of international law and human rights. And you also rightly refer to this in your report. We will be discussing such cooperation, as I said, at the forthcoming EU-US summit and also at the summit with Canada. And so the wide spectrum of matters in their agenda will, of course, include a particular emphasis on COVID-19 and the recovery, protecting our planet and building a more democratic, peaceful and secure world. To all these objectives your report contributes, and I praise you for that. Dear Members, I note your call for close cooperation with regional organisations. This was also an important dimension of our joint communication on multilateralism. We are working to organise a European Union-African Union summit as soon as the pandemic allows it. Unhappily, the pandemic has created a one-year delay in having the summit. I just came back from Indonesia, where I had meetings with ASEAN in order to reinforce our relations with this very important regional organisation, as proof of the attention that we have to pay to this important strategic partner and the rollout of the European Union in the Indo-Pacific strategy. We already have this in the Pacific, a strategy, and this is a way of projecting ourselves or engaging more, reaching out better with such a set of important countries which are responsible today in the Pacific region for 60% of the global GNP. At the same time, we need to leverage our financial, diplomatic, commercial and technological strengths to defend our interests and values forcefully and successfully. This also means taking a more strategic approach to the election of leadership posts in multilateral organisations. Sometimes we are not enough united in order to be able to get some of these important posts, and recently it has been a couple of elections in which we Europeans haven’t shown enough unity. We are working with Member States to encourage greater coordination, the least we can say: we need greater coordination on the international fora. And finally, let me inform you that the Foreign Affairs Council will soon adopt conclusions on our priorities for the forthcoming session of the United Nations General Assembly. I take note of the recommendation in your report. It provides a timely political input for finalising this work and for the implementation of the joint communication on multilateralism. And I am happy to see that the High Representative, the European Commission, the Council and the Parliament work together on the same approach and with the same perspective in order to influence the world and to implement this effective multilateralism that you have been asking for in your report.