Dominica, 2007

Let me at the outset

congratulate Mr. Kerim on his election as President of

the General Assembly at its sixty-second session and

assure him of the cooperation of the Dominica

delegation throughout this session. I commend his

predecessor, Sheikha Haya Rashed Al-Khalifa, for her

leadership during the sixty-first session of the General

Assembly.

I also wish to congratulate Secretary-General Ban

Ki-moon on his election. I wish him a long and

successful tenure, and hope that under his leadership

the United Nations will give greater attention to the

plight of the world’s small island developing States,

which are among the most vulnerable to climate

change, natural disasters and a rise in sea levels.

In the interdependent world which we live in

today, the promotion of the fundamental values of

peace, democracy, human rights and development

depends on strong multilateral institutions. Dominica

believes that it is only a strong United Nations,

sensitive to the variable geometry of its own complex

construction, that can serve as the foundation of our

shared ambitions for effective multilateralism and a

rules-based international order.

The experience of the past decade has taught us

one important lesson: global challenges require global

responses, and those challenges can receive the

appropriate responses only through the framework of

multilateral action. The United Nations is the

undisputed centre for multilateralism, and we must all

demonstrate unwavering commitment to vesting in the

United Nations the authority and to offering it the

space to undertake effective interventions in the

interest of the preservation of human life, human

rights, peace, justice, democracy and the rule of law.

More than ever, we need a United Nations which

is not only guided by the principles that oversaw its

creation, but capable of adapting to the growing

challenges of today’s globalized world. We need an

effective United Nations that will place the highest

priority on development, while having the capacity to

respond to the various crises that threaten international

peace and security.

The work of the international community in

poverty alleviation must be accelerated as the chasm

between the rich and the poor continues to widen. In

that connection, the importance of achieving the

Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015 is

critical. We must therefore rededicate ourselves to the

implementation of the actions called for in the United

Nations Decade for the Eradication of Poverty and in

relevant resolutions of the General Assembly, including

those related to the right to development, the

alleviation of burdensome debt, and fair and equitable

trading rules.

Climate change is the most pressing

environmental problem humankind has ever faced. It

seriously threatens human security and will undermine

our ability to achieve the MDGs. Unless there is a

global and collective response, this planet will become

unlivable for most of us.

Small island developing States are most

vulnerable to the effects of climate change, even

though they contribute the least to emissions of

greenhouse gases. Sea-level rise threatens the

territorial existence of small island developing States,

and low-lying islands in the Indian Ocean, the Pacific

and the Caribbean may simply disappear in the next 30

years or less as the melting of ice caps and mountain

glaciers on all continents becomes the new reality of

unchecked climate change. The disappearance of

beaches and coastal tourism plants and the loss of

coastal communication infrastructure would devastate

the tourism economy of most island States. Other

regions are also beginning to experience the effects of

those climatic changes, with persistent conditions of

drought followed by devastating flooding.

Rising sea temperature is causing death and the

bleaching of coral reefs, which in turn are impacting

negatively on fish stocks, the major protein source of

island States. It is estimated that a one-degree increase

in sea temperature over pre-industrial levels will lead

to significant loss of tuna and dolphin stocks for a large

number of island States.

Rising sea temperature also provides a fertile

ground for the development of tropical storms and

hurricanes, which affect the Caribbean region every

year. Climate change is contributing to the frequency

and severity of those storms. We are currently in the

midst of the 2007 hurricane season and, over a two-

week period in the month of August, the Caribbean

region suffered the onslaught of two category-5

hurricanes, Dean and Felix. Those storms seriously

affected Dominica, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Saint

Lucia, Jamaica, Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua and

Mexico. We are only half-way through this hurricane

season, which is forecast to have seven category-5

hurricanes. It may very well be that the worst is yet to

come.

My own country, Dominica, was severely

battered by Hurricane Dean, the third-worst hurricane

to make landfall in the Caribbean since 1850. After 15

hours of buffeting by winds of 110 miles per hour and

continuous rainfall, our agricultural economy was

destroyed, our infrastructure devastated by swollen

rivers and numerous landslides, and our housing stock

seriously affected. We appreciate greatly the solidarity

of a number of countries, regional and extra-regional,

and the generous support they provided in the

immediate aftermath, but now comes the serious

challenge of reconstruction, which is estimated to cost

over a $100 million.

The high-level event on climate change helped to

underscore that doing nothing about climate change

will have enormous negative implications for all

countries, and more particularly for the least developed

countries and small island developing States. The pace

of climate change negotiations is disconcertingly slow

because it is not adequately responsive to the urgency

dictated by science.

We urge all the nations of the world to come to

Bali in December prepared to advance the multilateral

negotiations. A demonstration of collective political

will and commitment to determined action will be

critical if we are to reach agreement on a fair, effective,

flexible and inclusive climate regime under the United

Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

and its Kyoto Protocol. Developed countries and the

more advanced developing countries must make a

greater effort to do more and to be considerate of the

emergency situation facing the small island States.

We continue to stress that the vulnerable situation

of the small island developing States must be addressed

through the vigorous implementation of the actions

called for in the Mauritius Strategy for the Further

Implementation of the Programme of Action for the

Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing

States.

We call for the full implementation of the

mandates contained in the Millennium Declaration, in

particular the commitments to development and

poverty eradication, the protection of the common

environment, and the realization of human rights,

democracy and good governance. As a follow-up to the

reform commitments emanating from the 2005

Summit, we welcome the reports of the High-level

Panel and of the Secretary-General on system-wide

coherence, and we hope for the strengthened capacity

of the United Nations in development, humanitarian

assistance and the environment.

The adoption of the Global Counter-Terrorism

Strategy by the General Assembly was an important

achievement. It will be meaningless, however, if we do

not address its full implementation. Small States like

Dominica and the rest of the States members of the

Organization of the Eastern Caribbean States must be

assisted to meet the various obligations required by the

implementation of the counter-terrorism conventions.

As a country with an indigenous Kalinago

population, Dominica is proud to have played a role in

the negotiation process that led to the recent adoption

of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of

Indigenous People, and we call on those Member

States that have not yet done so to embrace the

Declaration.

Dominica applauds the African Union for its

unwavering efforts towards the maintenance of peace

and security on the African continent, and we are

supportive of the long-term vision of an African peace

and security architecture. In that context, Dominica

welcomes the creation of the African Union-United

Nations Hybrid Operation in Darfur, which we hope

will contribute to the political resolution of the conflict

there and bring to an end its tragic humanitarian

consequences in the Sudan and the neighbouring

States.

In our region, we welcome the continuing

engagement of the United Nations and the

Organization of American States in Haiti. We urge the

United Nations to make the commitment to going

beyond the current engagement through the United

Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) to

a longer-term engagement that will bring sustainable

economic stability and development to Haiti. We

appreciate the important role of Brazil and the other

Member States that are participating in MINUSTAH,

but we must be careful not to see those interventions as

the emergency response of an international fire brigade

quickly extinguishing political conflagrations and

remaining only long enough to dampen the embers of

renewed conflict.

Haiti’s problems stem from underdevelopment

and extensive periods of dictatorship. It is in

democracy and development, therefore, that the

solutions for Haiti lie. A stable and prosperous Haiti

will significantly strengthen the Caribbean Community

and contribute meaningfully to the process of

deepening regional integration and the attendant march

towards the Caribbean single market and economy.

Recent violent upheavals in Myanmar are not

encouraging for the hoped-for resolution of the long-

standing difficulties afflicting that country in its

transition to democracy. We urge influential countries

in South-East Asia that have friendly relations with the

military regime in Rangoon to use their good offices in

support of the United Nations effort to bring about a

political solution and national reconciliation among all

concerned parties.

The continued presence of the Republic of

France, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the United

Kingdom and the United States of America in the

Caribbean should provide an opportunity for the

strategic engagement of those metropoles, Canada and

Spain with the independent Caribbean States to create

in the Caribbean a zone of peace, security and

prosperity, complementing the invaluable development

assistance of the People’s Republic of China, the

Republic of Cuba, the Bolivarian Republic of

Venezuela, Japan and the European Union.

I wish to underscore the vital importance of a fair

global trading system as the only way for small States

to survive in this globalized world. We do not want to

depend on fast-disappearing development assistance.

We want to have the assurance that we will be able to

trade the goods and services we produce on terms and

conditions that will enable us to build our economies

and to provide employment for our citizens. That is

why we continue to call for the earliest possible

conclusion of the Doha Development Round of the

World Trade Organization (WTO). We urge the major

trading nations to demonstrate a spirit of compromise

and constructiveness, backed by a genuine will to

commit to a balanced agreement that embraces the

principle of special and differential treatment for small

island developing States and places development at the

centre of any final agreement.

Dominica has made important progress in its

quest to adapt to the challenges of trade liberalization

and its attendant preference erosion. Those changing

terms of trade have progressively devastated our

primary source of foreign exchange earnings the

export of bananas. That persistent assault on our

banana exports to the European Union through

unrelenting recourse to the WTO dispute settlement

body has impacted negatively on our overall economy.

As a result, we have had to undergo a structural

adjustment programme and undertake stringent fiscal

measures that have required sacrifices by the

population as a whole in order to stabilize the

deteriorating fiscal and economic position. We have

turned the corner and returned to a period of sustained

economic growth, and are moving steadily to the

diversification of our economy. The impact of

Hurricane Dean so soon afterwards will therefore be

doubly devastating.

We are working towards a new energy regime

that will significantly reduce our dependence on fossil

fuels for our energy needs and slow the haemorrhaging

of scarce foreign exchange earnings to meet the ever-

rising cost of petroleum products. We plan to increase

our current 40-per cent renewable energy generation

from hydropower through initiatives for geothermal

energy development and further expansion of

hydropower. We will need the continuing partnership

of the development partners to remain on that path

towards successful economic transformation.

May I call on the United Nations once more to

rededicate itself to making development the highest

priority of this body. Together, the developed countries

and the developing countries must work in a

cooperative manner to address the challenges of

climate change and sustainable development. We can

work together to defeat poverty and underdevelopment

and to give hope and dignity to all peoples. To achieve

that, we must implement the decisions that we take

here in this General Assembly every year. The time for

action is now.