Indonesia, 2012

May peace be upon us all.

I am honoured to represent my country, Indonesia, at

this year’s General Assembly debate to discuss how we

can find better ways to peacefully resolve or manage

conflicts around the world.

This, of course, is what the United Nations is all

about: to end the scourge of war, and to create a peaceful

and equitable world order based on international

cooperation.

In the decades since its founding, the United Nations

has developed a number of instruments to address

conflicts in all their manifestations. During those

decades, many inter-State and intra-State conflicts have

been resolved — those in Angola, Bosnia, Cambodia,

Timor-Leste, as well as many others.

The question we must now ask is whether those

instruments are adequate to address the whole spectrum

of conflicts that the world community now faces.

That is clearly evident in the Syrian crisis. The

world community is witnessing, with great pain,

the worsening violence and unfolding humanitarian

catastrophe on the ground; at the same time, the United

Nations is in a state of paralysis in responding to the

situation. There is no end in sight to the conflict, and it

appears that we have not yet seen the worst of the crisis.

Indonesia therefore reiterates its call for the

immediate cessation of violence in Syria, which has

taken a high toll in innocent civilian lives. The Security

Council must now unite and act decisively, as mandated

by the United Nations Charter, to bring the situation

under control.

Clearly, whatever the explanation, the present

international system cannot for now resolve the Syrian

conflict. There is every likelihood that the community

of nations will see similar conflicts in future. It will

be in a different corner of the world, and in a different

form, with different actors. It will not help the cause

of international peace if, once again, we end up being

divided and unable to positively alter the course of the

conflict. The world community must develop ways to

address them more effectively, towards their peaceful

end.

We must adapt to twenty-first century security

challenges. There is no question that the world we live

in today is in much better condition than it was in the

twentieth century. Freedom has spread. The threat of

nuclear holocaust is receding significantly. There is

no prospect of a world war, the kind that twice created

such destruction during the twentieth century. The

global economy has expanded remarkably. Nations

are becoming more interdependent. International

cooperation and partnerships are flourishing.

However, it is only relative peace, not total peace

as yet. We have moved from the era of the cold war to

an era of “warm peace”. In this warm peace, the world

remains stuck with an outdated international security

architecture that still reflects twentieth-century

circumstances, in contrast with the global economic

architecture, which has done much better in adjusting

to the twenty-first century.

In this warm peace, the relationships between the

major Powers are, for the first time, marked by relative

stability and increased cooperation. But the question

remains unanswered as to how they will accommodate

the growing ranks of emerging Powers that are

reshaping the world order.

In this warm peace, old enmities and long-standing

conflicts can still resurface in the new strategic

landscape, even carried on by new generations.

In this warm peace, we are seeing new security

challenges and opportunities arising from the seismic

power shifts that are occurring in some regions. The

security implications of the political events in the

Middle East are still unfolding.

In this warm peace, the world community still has

to contend with an array of unfinished business: the

Arab-Israeli conflict, nuclear disarmament, territorial disputes in the South China Sea, tensions in the Korean

peninsula, and the like.

In this warm peace, new progress can easily regress.

Hard-won peace processes can stall or even crumble.

Strategic miscalculations in disputed theatres may lead

to rising tensions and armed clashes.

And in this warm peace, pockets of hatred and

bigotry, intolerance and extremism continue to litter

our world.

Perhaps we will have to live with this warm

peace for decades. But I believe that we can lower the

temperature of this warm peace. Where possible, we

can resolve conflicts one by one. We can strengthen

the building blocks of peace. We can promote a new

globalism that can potentially change the dynamics of

conflict resolution.

In order to do that, we need to try new approaches

and be more imaginative. The first thing we have to

do is to evolve a new strategic mindset. Let us face it:

remnants of the cold-war mentality still persist in parts

of the geopolitical landscape, not least in our own United

Nations, where rigid, dogmatic, zero-sum calculations

sometimes still come into play. For long-term peace, a

peace born of trust and mutual confidence, we must get

rid of that mindset. In that light, we must continue to

work towards a reformed Security Council, a Council

that reflects the strategic realities of the twenty-first

century and provides security to all.

We must also work to perfect the instruments of

peace, which include robust regionalism. We in the

Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have

seen how such regionalism can be a force for peace and

cooperation. As a result of a strong regionalism, all of

South-east Asia has thrived under ASEAN cooperation.

South-east Asia, which was once the cockpit of border

wars and the proxy wars of extra-regional Powers, has

come together.

After ASEAN was founded, in 1967, it devoted

the early decades of its life as a regional organization

to cultivating the habits of dialogue, consultation and

cooperation, not only among its members but with its

dialogue partners. Thus, each ASEAN country adopted

a new strategic mindset based on trust and a sense of

having a stake in the success and progress of all the

others. Today the ASEAN family is united and at peace

with itself and with the rest of the world.

At the same time, we can also develop a universal

culture of mutual tolerance and mutual appreciation of

one another’s religious convictions. In such a world,

the voice of the moderates — the voice of reason and

compassion — would be heard clearly over the din of

prejudice and bigotry. In a global regime of compassion

and tolerance, no war is possible.

As a nation that celebrates its diversity of culture

and religions, Indonesia calls for mutual respect and

understanding among peoples of different faiths.

Despite initiatives undertaken by States at the United

Nations and in other forums, the defamation of religions

persists. We have seen yet another of its ugly faces in

the film “ Innocence of Muslims” that is now causing

an international uproar.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

underlines that, in exercising freedom of expression,

everyone must observe morality and public order.

Freedom of expression is therefore not absolute. Hence,

I call for an international instrument to effectively

prevent incitement to hostility or violence based on

religion or belief. As the product of international

consensus, that instrument should serve as a point

of reference with which the world community must

comply.

For good measure, we also need to promote

a continuing process of dialogue among faiths,

civilizations and cultures. Of course, that dialogue

should not remain a dialogue, but should translate into

actual cooperation so that peoples of different cultures

and faiths can come together as a community and

care for one another. Those communities will become

bulwarks for peace and they will make it difficult if not

impossible for any kind of armed conflict to erupt.

We must also master the art of preventive diplomacy.

Most disputes are intractable; they simmer for what

seems to be an eternity, but by a historical reckoning

they are not really long, drawn-out affairs. Sooner or

later, there comes a conf luence of factors and events

that provides a window of opportunity for resolving a

dispute and removing conflict from the table of options.

That is what we in ASEAN have done with the

potential conflicts in the South China Sea. The territorial

and sovereignty disputes have been festering there for

the better part of a century. But we are managing them

with restraint, confidence-building and, at present,

through earnest negotiations toward a legally binding

code of conduct in the South China Sea.

Finally, the culture of peace, mutual tolerance and

appreciation, and cooperation must be supported by the

right kind of economics. People need to be fed, to be

sheltered and to be assured of a future where they have

opportunities for a living and a livelihood. That is the

only way for peace to be locked in for the long term;

that is, when it brings dividends that give human beings

robust confidence in the future.

The price of inequality between and within nations

gives rise to tension born of grievances that can, unless

effectively addressed, lead to radicalism and even

violence, which threaten international and national

peace and security. The solution is to form a global

partnership for poverty eradication and for achieving

the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and then

to formulate a post-MDG development agenda we can

fully carry out.

Our experience in the resolution of the intra-state

conflict in the province of Aceh proves that, if we do

enough for peace, if there is a conf luence of favourable

circumstances, and if we are prepared to seize the

moment, then peace can be achieved. The peace that we

achieve will not only give temporary respite, it will also

last for generations.

For many years, peace has been treated as if it

were a science. There are whole libraries about how

it can be achieved and preserved. I have come to the

conclusion, however, that if peace has a technology it is

one born of experience. That experience can be shared

and can be useful in creating new experience. And if

there is enough sharing of experiences — and that is

what Indonesia is trying to achieve — and if there is

sufficient political will to apply what is learned from

others to one’s unique circumstances, then peace can be

widely spread. Peace can be effectively waged. And we

would have a gentler, better world.