Republic of the Congo, 1998

It is a pleasure for me to convey to you, Sir, the

satisfaction of the delegation of Congo at seeing you

conducting our work. Your unanimous election to the

presidency of the fifty-third session of the General

Assembly not only denotes recognition by the

international community of your great qualities as a

statesman and experienced diplomat, but also attests to the

important role played by your country, Uruguay, in the

maintenance of peace in the world.

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Mr. President, I wish to convey to you and to the

other members of the Bureau our heartfelt, sincere

congratulations and to assure you of the full cooperation of

the delegation of Congo. I should like also to pay well-

deserved tribute to your predecessor, Mr. Hennadiy

Udovenko, for the competence and open-mindedness with

which he conducted the work of the previous session.

Finally, I wish to express the appreciation of our

delegation to the Secretary-General of our Organization,

Mr. Kofi Annan, who, in a world where violence, injustice

and frustration predominate, has been tirelessly striving to

assert the virtues of dialogue and tolerance and to promote

peace and development. Peace and development: these two

ideals have for decades posed a major challenge to the

international community.

It is very difficult to take the floor after all of the

outstanding and talented speakers who have spoken from

this rostrum. What more could I add to all of the points so

eloquently made about Africa and the rest of the world?

For more than a decade now, Africa has made the

headlines only as the result of crises and conflicts: civil

wars, inter-State wars, drought, famine and epidemics. All

of these obstacles so impede the development of our

continent that we cannot but wonder whether Africa will be

entering the third millennium on the wrong foot.

Unfortunately, Congo, my country, is an example of

this. A year ago, Congo had been in the throes of a civil

war for five long months. The international community and

our Organization in particular strove hard to find a

negotiated solution to the conflict. We wish to pay tribute

to the commendable efforts made by the Secretary-General

jointly with a numerous African heads of State.

Unfortunately, we all know that these efforts were

unsuccessful.

We are convinced that respect for the state of law and

good governance remain, in a sound economic environment,

a prerequisite for the well-being of our peoples. And it is

because they did not understand this point that the former

ruling class imposed on the peaceful citizens of my country

two civil wars in the space of five years, the latest of

which — that of 1997 — was the most deadly and the most

devastating.

We do not intend to dwell on the many ways the

former regime violated the rules of democracy, even if this

would be helpful in understanding the causes of the tragic

events that my country has experienced.

Today the war is over. Congo is resolutely looking

to the future. The future means national reconciliation; it

means rebuilding our devastated country; it means

resuming the democratic process.

From 5 to 14 January last, a national forum was held

at Brazzaville to study practical modalities to attain these

goals. That forum, which brought together more than

1,400 participants representing all segments of Congolese

society, established a transitional Parliament and set the

duration for this transitional period at three years.

The Government of National Unity and Public

Salvation is now concentrating on the following priorities:

the reconciliation of all the sons and daughters of the

country; the rehabilitation of our infrastructure; the

restoration of State administration; the resumption of the

democratic process — census-taking started again last

August; the reorganization of our national economy with,

inter alia, the privatization of the major State companies;

and the resumption of negotiations with international

financial institutions, which concluded in June this year

with the adoption of a post-conflict programme.

Today, in the light of the results obtained, we can

state that the transitional timetable will be respected.

These encouraging results have yet to be

consolidated, and our country is still fragile because of

the turmoil in the subregion.

The events taking place in the Democratic Republic

of the Congo cause great concern to my country, since

our stability largely depends on that of our neighbours. I

therefore want to reaffirm the Congolese Government?s

commitment to respect the sovereignty and territorial

integrity of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Our

country will never serve as a base of operations for the

destabilization of this fraternal country.

Understanding the costs of civil war and anxious to

contribute to finding a political solution to this crisis,

Congo (Brazzaville) has been working with its various

contacts among all the States of the subregion. This was

the case in Durban during the summit of the Non-Aligned

Countries, when President Denis Sassou Nguesso met

most of his counterparts, and more recently in Libreville,

at the summit of Central African heads of State.

Our country intends to honour its commitments

under the relevant provisions of Conventions of the

Organization of African Unity and the United Nations

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relating to refugees and displaced persons. Therefore, I

must solemnly repudiate the false allegations by certain

media of a supposed agreement between the Governments

of the two Congos to transfer displaced Rwandans located

in Congo (Brazzaville) to Congo (Kinshasa) so that they

can participate in the war. The displaced Rwandans living

in Congo (Brazzaville) are in fact under the control of the

Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for

Refugees, and any movement of them is taking place

without the support of our Government, which wishes to

inform the international community that it refuses to accept

any responsibility for the consequences.

In Angola the hopes aroused by the Lusaka Protocol

have been continually dashed by the bad faith and sudden

reversals of position of Mr. Jonas Savimbi, who is thereby

taking a whole segment of the Angolan people hostage,

denying them the opportunity to pursue development tasks.

My country firmly supports the Angolan Government in its

efforts to achieve lasting peace in the country and to

finalize rapidly and completely the implementation of the

Lusaka Accords. My country completely supports the

decision adopted by the Southern African Development

Community heads of State or Government in Mauritius,

describing Mr. Jonas Savimbi as the person solely

responsible for the deterioration of the situation in Angola

and calling upon other States to refrain from providing any

support for Mr. Jonas Savimbi and his militarist wing.

I would like to take this occasion to pay tribute to the

memory of Alioune Blondin Beye, a worthy son of Africa,

who gave the best of himself, including making the

supreme sacrifice, in the search for peace in Angola.

As regards other hot spots, the Congo always

advocates negotiated solutions. Therefore, we welcome the

ceasefire in Guinea-Bissau, and we hope that it will be used

to work out a final solution to that conflict.

The same goes for the conflict between Ethiopia and

Eritrea; in this regard, we support the efforts of the

Organization of African Unity mediation committee.

We cannot overlook the crises and tensions prevailing

in other parts of the world, notably in the Middle East,

where the peace process relaunched by the Oslo Accords is

now stalled, but also in South Asia, where the recent

nuclear tests conducted by India and then Pakistan have

heightened the already high level of tension.

The establishment of just and lasting peace in the

world requires full recognition of the destabilizing factors

as well as of the real solutions to development problems.

One only needs recall the extent to which peace and

development are linked.

In the light of the changes in the world, and after

more than half a century of existence, the United Nations

seems to be gradually and dangerously moving away from

the vision of its founding fathers. Solidarity seems to be

giving way to a selfishness that has no time for

solidarity. This new trend is making increasingly

difficult the management of economic questions, which

have already been the subject of much thought, without

producing any prospect of an improvement in the living

standards of the peoples of most of our States.

Violence, famine, disease and poverty continue to

afflict our peoples. The underlying causes of these

scourges are constantly the subject of a multitude of

studies and various economic stimulation and

development programmes, but without result, because of

a lack of real commitment by the international

community. The Agenda for Development, the

international strategy for the development of Africa, the

Secretary-General?s System-wide Special Initiative on

Africa — to cite merely those examples — are just so

many plans that no longer give reason for optimism.

Today globalization is supposed to be the panacea.

This at least is the philosophy of worldwide liberalization.

But how can we be confident when the export

opportunities for the developing countries are often

neutralized by protectionism in a new guise, which uses

various pretexts — technical standards, environmental and

social concerns, or even concerns about human rights?

How can we be confident when official development

assistance continues to decline? How can we be sure

when the weakest economies are bending beneath the

burden of debt?

With regard to Africa, we believe that through

economic integration we can mitigate the undesirable

effects of globalization. Through greater solidarity we can

hope to meet the challenges we face.

This year the international community is

commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal

Declaration of Human Rights. It is very significant that

this anniversary coincides with the establishment of the

International Criminal Court, which our Government

considers to be a major step forward. We believe that this

event puts the finishing touch to the magnificent edifice

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that the founding fathers began constructing more than 50

years ago.

But today?s United Nations is not the same as the old

one. Where once there were only a few dozen Member

States, today there are 185. The problems of peace and

development are not what they were in 1945. It is time to

review the management of our communal house. It is time

to reform the Organization, including the Security Council.

It is time to democratize the Organization in order to better

adapt it to the requirements of the coming millennium.

I cannot conclude without expressing the compassion

of the Congolese Government and those affected by the

calamity now afflicting the Caribbean and the southern

United States as a result of hurricane Georges. This wanton

unleashing of the forces of nature reminds us that we are

all, large and small, in the same boat — our planet

Earth — and that we must show solidarity to one another.