Canada, 2001

It is indeed an honour to

be here in New York City and at the General Assembly.

That we are gathered here now, just two months since

the devastating terrorist attacks of 11 September,

demonstrates both the resilience of this great city and

the determination and defiance of a united global

community.

Having spent last Sunday — like my friend Prime

Minister Dzurinda of Slovakia — running through so

many streets and communities of the five boroughs of

New York City in the annual New York City Marathon,

I have witnessed personally and been quite

overwhelmed by the deep reserves of courage evident

in this city and in all those individuals who are

choosing to take back their lives and reject the menace

of terror.

Our job is to galvanize and to focus the courage

of nations — to transform sentiment into commitment,

and commitment into action. Expressions of a common

outrage are gratifying but they will never be enough to

defeat terrorism. The ultimate success of our

campaign — this long and extremely complex

campaign — rests upon our collective ability to

demonstrate leadership, to harness political will and to

sustain the commitment that we have made to each

other and to our citizens: that we will not allow crimes

so vile, so immense and so shattering to the world to be

unanswered or ever to be repeated.

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In order to achieve these goals — and to merit the

trust and fulfil the expectations placed in the United

Nations and its constituent Member States — we

cannot go on as before. There can be no more

“business as usual”. There is no more time, there is no

more patience and there are no more resources for

diplomatic gamesmanship and the stoking of dangerous

self-interest. National Governments must take

responsibility and be held accountable for their actions

and decisions — for fighting terrorism, for undertaking

political and legal reforms, for resolving disputes and

for establishing the conditions in which democracy

flourishes and development is sustained.

(spoke in French)

The United Nations is now facing its greatest test

ever since its creation. So far, the United Nations is

performing admirably. The unity of purpose and

effective decision-making that allowed swift passage of

the landmark Security Council resolution 1373 (2001)

and the rapid convening of a special debate on

terrorism provide clear evidence of what we can

accomplish together, and further underscore the

reasons why this Organization and its esteemed

Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, were deservedly

recognized with the Nobel Peace Prize this year.

(spoke in English)

We cannot, however, afford to lose ourselves in

complacency, self-congratulation or distraction. Our

work has only just begun.

Horrific as the atrocities perpetrated on 11

September were, terrorism did not begin here.

Unfortunately, too many of us in this Hall know this all

too painfully. No, it did not begin here; but we as a

global community have the responsibility, and now a

renewed opportunity, to ensure that we end it — here.

The United Nations has a unique and

indispensable role to play. While the campaign against

terrorism will be conducted through coalitions of

different State actors, alliances and organizations, this

is where it must ultimately all come together in its

political, diplomatic, legal, economic, humanitarian

and security dimensions. We in Canada, as long-

standing proponents of multilateralism and the United

Nations system, have strongly welcomed the close

collaboration evident between the United States

Administration and the United Nations over these last

two months.

In Canada, the campaign against terrorism,

including the obligations we have undertaken here at

the United Nations, is our highest priority. Our country,

which shares with the United States the longest

unmilitarized border in the world and the closest, most

extensive and most profitable bilateral relationship

anywhere, has been deeply affected by this crisis.

Canadians, like Americans and citizens of many other

nations, are concerned about their security, but also

about what kind of a country and what kind of a world

they are to live in after 11 September. The interlinked

goals of protecting our citizens, providing assurance to

our partners and allies and preserving the character of

our free, democratic and diverse society have guided

the actions and decisions of Prime Minister Chrétien

and the Canadian Government throughout this crisis.

We have committed 2000 armed forces personnel,

ships, aircraft and special forces to the international

military coalition against terrorism; and at home, we

have introduced a wide range of measures, legislation

and new investments to bolster our security framework,

including at the border and at our airports.

Canada welcomes the reporting and monitoring

functions provided for in Security Council resolution

1373 (2001). We have already implemented many of its

provisions and are moving quickly on the rest. We are

well advanced in the preparation of our report and will

provide it to the Counter-Terrorism Committee well

ahead of the 90-day deadline. We urge other Member

nations to demonstrate their continued resolve and

solidarity by doing likewise. Canada is prepared to

support those States for which implementation poses a

great challenge.

As we take steps in compliance with resolution

1373 (2001), we are completing our ratification of the

Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings

and the Convention for the Suppression of the

Financing of Terrorism, which will make Canada a full

party to all 12 existing United Nations counter-

terrorism conventions. Negotiations are under way on

the thirteenth convention, the comprehensive

convention against international terrorism. That

convention will ensure that all terrorist acts are

condemned under international law. What is needed

now is the political will to complete the negotiations. If

not the General Assembly of the United Nations, then

who? And if not now, then when? The time will never

be more propitious, or the need greater.

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Our international legal framework also requires a

strong arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament

regime. Implementation of the Ottawa Convention

banning anti-personnel mines is proceeding apace. To

keep weapons of mass destruction from becoming

employed as the instruments of evil, we are also hard at

work to reinforce key instruments such as the Nuclear

Non-Proliferation Treaty, the International Atomic

Energy Agency safeguards, the Chemical Weapons

Convention and the Biological Weapons Convention,

all requiring strong multilateral action to ensure their

full implementation.

I would also add that we are now very close to

making the International Criminal Court a reality, with

only 17 more ratifications to go. The creation of the

Court will represent an extremely significant step in the

ongoing struggle to eliminate impunity for the worst

crimes known to humankind.

These are only the most immediate and most

obvious steps to ensure our collective security, but our

agenda must be far broader than this. Nothing has more

violently shaken our sense of security than have the

events of 11 September. But our conception of what

constitutes security and the nature of the threats that

may be posed to it was already undergoing dramatic

evolution prior to the attacks.

The denial of human rights, the spread of

HIV/AIDS, persistent mass poverty, unchecked

environmental degradation and the blight of drugs and

crime all undermine stability, reduce human potential

and obstruct social and economic progress. They are

threats to human security, as are discrimination and

racism, which the Durban Conference was intended to

address. Unfortunately, it failed to achieve its potential

and instead provided a forum for propagating long-

standing hatreds and biases, and the world is poorer for

that.

The resolution and prevention of conflict must

also remain at the highest order of United Nations

business, but leadership and commitment are required

if we are to move from a culture of reaction to one of

prevention, as proposed by the Secretary-General.

Just a week ago, I ended a five-country visit to

the Middle East. I was reassured by the commitments

of my hosts to the fight against terrorism. As have

others, I urged Israel and the Palestinians to put

immediately into place measures that will bring them

back to the negotiating table. That is their only way

forward. The essential truth is that there is no

alternative to peaceful coexistence. That conflict

cannot go on forever and leaders must act now to bring

it to an end. The international community must also

increase its efforts to help bring about a just peace.

Finally, there is little that is more debilitating to

humankind than the ravages of extreme poverty. This is

most notable in Africa, which will be a principal focus

for the G-8 in 2002, when Canada will assume the G-8

chair. Speaking at this rostrum in 1963, Prime Minister

Lester B. Pearson, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, warned

the world of the dangers of a growing disparity in

economic and social development between nations. He

urged that this “must be corrected before it creates an

unbridgeable gulf between ‘have’ and ‘have-not’

nations” (A/PV.1208, para. 60). That was 38 years ago

and the challenge remains more acute than ever.

The pledges of the Millennium Summit in

September 2000 must not be overshadowed by the

urgency of the events that have taken place one year

later. Indeed, their fulfilment can and must form an

integral component of how we create a strong,

equitable global environment that can be neither

attacked nor exploited by terrorists.

Terrorism does not speak to us; it does not speak

for anyone but criminals and murderers and it only

serves to undermine the causes they purport to

represent. It does not represent Islam; it does not

reflect the will of the Afghan people.

(spoke in French)

The fate of the Afghan people must remain

sharply in our focus. That country has been so

neglected, so abused and so driven into isolation by its

self-appointed rulers that it could not even be ranked

on the most recent United Nations human development

index. The rights of its people — notably women and

girls — have been blatantly and repeatedly violated.

(spoke in English)

An acute humanitarian crisis is building and we

must do more, working with United Nations agencies

and other relief organizations, to ensure that

civilians — including refugees and internally displaced

persons — are protected and have access to food and to

aid.

For this reason, Canada responded to the United

Nations humanitarian appeal, adding further resources

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to the $160 million in aid that we had already provided

over the last 10 years. We were also pleased at the

prompt appointment of Lakhdar Brahimi — who has

played such an integral role in the reform of United

Nations peacekeeping — as the Secretary-General’s

Special Representative for Afghanistan. Canada has

pledged to work with Ambassador Brahimi and other

coalition States to support the Afghan people in the

search for a stable, fair and effective administration

that can begin the enormous task of leading

Afghanistan forward to a more secure and hopeful

future.

The opportunities for progress towards a more

free, prosperous and peaceful world have always been

before us. In the haze of self-interest and competing

priorities, sometimes our global community has not

seen them so clearly. The enormous horror of 11

September has offered us that clarity, just as it has

concentrated minds and catalysed relationships. It has

given us a renewed basis for cooperation between

States both in and outside the United Nations, driven

not only by the United States and its traditional allies,

including Canada, but also through opportunities for

leadership provided to Russia and China, to India and

Pakistan, to countries of the Middle East, North Africa,

Asia and elsewhere in the resolution of this crisis.

Terrorism globalizes us. It globalizes outrage and

condemnation, just as it does compassion and the cry

for justice. We must ensure that terrorism also

globalizes a sustained commitment to bringing about

its end.

Tomorrow, 11 November, Canada and other

United Nations Member nations will mark our annual

Remembrance Day. On this day, we remember and

honour the men and women who have fought and

sacrificed for our freedom. This week in New York, I

hope that we will all take time to remember what it is

that we are together working — and, yes, fighting —

for today: for freedom, for peace and for justice, and

for the dignity and realization of the potential of all

peoples everywhere.

As we make our speeches, file our papers and

press forward our resolutions in this great Hall, let us

also remember that the words “United Nations” —

coined by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1942 —

not only refer to an Organization or a name on a

building, but were first and foremost a declaration of

solidarity and of a common vision for a better world.