India, 2004

Allow me to congratulate you,

Sir, on your election as President of the General

Assembly at its fifty-ninth session. May I assure you of

India’s full support in ensuring its success.

As we gather here in the sixtieth year since the

United Nations was founded, we might perhaps pause

to reflect on the fate of the ideas and ideals of the

international community that inspired its creation. The

post-war generation had already become aware that the

world which had emerged from the ashes of a global

war could no longer be a peaceful world unless the

underlying forces of conflict were addressed

effectively by the entire community of nations as a

collectivity. Nations were therefore united to make the

world a safer and more peaceful place — a world in

which free peoples could pursue together a destiny of

shared prosperity.

The impulse behind the creation of global

institutions nearly 60 years ago has become an even

more pressing reality today. If we look around us, the

single most defining characteristic of our contemporary

world is the global, transnational character of the

challenges we confront, whether these are in the realm

of international security or in that of development.

Virtually every major issue that we face as nation-

States has both a domestic and a transnational

dimension. It is becoming increasingly apparent as

never before that, unless we fashion a global response

to those challenges based on a meaningful consensus,

we will not succeed in creating a world that truly

manifests the ideals of the United Nations.

Terrorism is one such challenge for which many

of us have paid an unacceptable price. We shall not

forget that, three years ago, it was this great city that

witnessed the single most horrendous terrorist act in

human history. Approximately three weeks ago, in

Russia, the world saw another brutal act of terror

which took the lives of hundreds of innocent civilians,

including a large number of young children.

Terrorism exploits the technologies spawned by

globalization, recruits its foot soldiers on ideologies of

bigotry and hatred, and directly targets democracies.

And yet, it is a sad reality that international networks

of terror appear to cooperate more effectively among

themselves than the democratic nations that they target.

We speak about cooperation, but we often seem

hesitant to commit ourselves to a truly global offensive

to root out terrorism with the pooling of resources, the

exchanging of information, the sharing of intelligence

and the unambiguous unity of purpose that is required.

That must change. We do have a global coalition

against terrorism; we must now give it substance and

credibility, avoiding selective approaches and political

expediency.

I now turn to other challenges that we face today,

such as the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

There is an increasing reliance on restrictive regimes

and on the use of punitive action to confront this threat

to international peace and security. Although India is

firmly opposed to proliferation and has an impeccable

record in that respect, we believe that it is only a global

consensus of willing nations that will ultimately prove

to be truly effective in that regard.

The Chemical Weapons Convention is a good

model to follow with respect to other weapons of mass

destruction, including nuclear weapons. It is through

representative institutions, rather than through

exclusive clubs of privileged countries, that we can

address global threats posed by the proliferation of

weapons of mass destruction and their means of

delivery. As far back as 1988, Prime Minister Rajiv

Gandhi outlined a series of specific steps in an action

plan, whose central proposition remains valid even

today — that progressive steps towards the elimination

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of weapons of mass destruction must be based on a

balance of obligations between those who possess such

weapons and those who do not.

It is quite evident today that a global discourse is

required for evolving a more cooperative and

consensual international security order. India believes

that such consensus must differentiate between States

whose actions strengthen non-proliferation and those

that weaken the realization of its objectives.

Let me now turn to the central theme for the vast

majority of United Nations Members; the challenge of

development and the eradication of mass poverty.

Globalization has undoubtedly brought enhanced

effectiveness and efficiency in the functioning of our

economies. It has integrated marketplaces, higher

standards of living and a revolution in global

connectivity.

But there is also the phenomenon of widening

economic disparities, both within and among countries.

Connectivity also means that the people are painfully

aware — in real time — of how far and how fast they

are falling behind in their relative living conditions.

Development today is no longer a function of domestic

resources and national policies alone. It is a process

that is vitally linked to the international economic

environment that the developing countries face.

The international community must find ways to

contract those circles of exclusion. We need to find

innovative sources of financing and access to new

technologies that are necessary to assist those who are

on the margins of globalization. Just as prosperity

cannot be sustained by being walled in, poverty cannot

be banished to some invisible periphery. Development

must therefore return to the centre of the global

discourse. We must evolve equitable and rule-based

regimes to manage global trade, investment flows and

the movement of services.

Four years ago, at our Millennium Summit, we

adopted ambitious global development goals, but it is a

matter of concern that we have already fallen behind in

their implementation.

While globalization has generated new

challenges, it has also given us new technologies to

deal with those massive challenges. The world faces

ominous pandemics such as HIV/AIDS, but it today

also possesses remedies and skills that can rid the

world of that scourge. We face problems of

environmental degradation in many parts of our planet,

but we also have available safe and environment-

friendly technologies.

Many countries are beset by problems of hunger

and malnutrition, but we possess modern techniques of

food production and processing to make a hunger-free

world a credible and realistic dream. Although our

excessive dependence on hydrocarbons raises concerns

about the long-term availability of energy and about

the security of supplies, technology has made available

many environmentally sound alternative technologies.

What we lack, however, is a truly global agreement and

a mobilization of the international community to

overcome the massive challenges.

The experience of the decades since the inception

of the United Nations demonstrates the great

significance of democracy as an instrument for

achieving both peace and prosperity. While it is

gratifying that the frontiers of democracy have

expanded dramatically in the last decade and a half,

they still exclude significant numbers.

Only a few months ago, in India’s fourteenth

general election, our country went through the largest

exercise of popular will in the world. I can therefore

assert with confidence, the importance that national

articulations in global forums have in truly reflecting

the democratically expressed will of their people. We

choose to overlook the absence of democracy in too

many cases for reasons of political expediency.

Democracy’s representative nature validates the

commitments we take on as countries; it should also

determine the manner in which the architecture of

international institutions evolves. What is required for

the international community to successfully deal with

global challenges — whether they be security

challenges, economic challenges or challenges in the

sphere of the environment — is the existence of

international institutions and a culture of genuine

multilateralism.

The United Nations and its specialized agencies

are the only instruments available for responding

effectively to the challenges we face collectively. But

what is missing is our sustained commitment to

democratizing the functioning of the United Nations.

It is common knowledge that the United Nations

is often unable to exert an effective influence on global

economic and political issues of critical importance.

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That is due to what may be called its democracy

deficit, which stands in the way of an effective

multilateralism based on a democratically-evolved

global consensus.

Therefore, reform and restructuring of the United

Nations system can alone provide a crucial link in an

expanding chain of efforts to refashion international

structures, imbuing them with a greater degree of

participatory decision-making so as to make them more

representative of contemporary realities.

Our Millennium Declaration recognized the

urgency of the reform of the United Nations Security

Council. An overwhelming majority of the world’s

population cannot be excluded from an institution that

today legislates on an increasing number of issues,

with an ever-widening impact. The expansion of the

Security Council, in the categories of both permanent

and non-permanent members, and the inclusion of

countries like India as permanent Members would be a

first step in the process of making the United Nations a

truly representative body.

I would like to make brief references to two

countries with which India has had historically friendly

ties and whose early return to political normalcy is the

focus of the world’s attention.

The situation in Iraq causes us great concern. The

United Nations has a central role to play in erasing the

discord of the recent past and in ensuring that the Iraqi

people can soon exercise effective sovereignty,

preserving the country’s unity and territorial integrity.

An end to the suffering of the Iraqi people and

recognition of their aspirations should be the guiding

objectives. Consistent with our longstanding ties of

friendship with the Iraqi people, India will contribute

to Iraq’s humanitarian and economic reconstruction.

In the past three years, the international

community has assisted Afghanistan in pulling back

from the brink of chaos and chronic instability. We

sincerely hope that the upcoming presidential elections

and the subsequent parliamentary elections will allow

the Afghan people to express their will, free from

interference and intimidation. India’s assistance to

Afghanistan’s reconstruction and development will

continue.

Relations between India and Pakistan have been a

matter of attention for the international community. It

is known that in January this year India and Pakistan

initiated a composite dialogue to resolve all issues,

including that of Jammu and Kashmir. I reaffirm our

determination to carry forward that dialogue to a

purposeful and mutually acceptable conclusion.

In closing, I would like to reaffirm India’s

commitment to the principles that have brought us

together in this Organization. Those principles retain

their relevance and validity even while the global

economy and the international political order pose new

and very different challenges. All of us have to grow

out of the comfort of the predictable, discard

constraining habits of thought, and move forward with

confidence to meet the demands of the present and the

future. Each of us has to be prepared to take on new

obligations and larger responsibilities relevant to the

needs of our time.

I deem it a privilege to say unhesitatingly that

India is conscious of the responsibilities that lie ahead.

I speak of an India on the move — on the cutting edge

of economic, technological and developmental

transformations. This is an India endowed with

outstanding human resources, and we are putting in

place policies which will respond to emerging and

critical tasks. We have the capabilities and capacity to

take these on, and to participate in the restructuring of

a just and dynamic world order. We are confident that,

in the inextricably interdependent world we live in, our

commitment to the common good, which this

Organization embodies, will be resolute and full.

In this, we are inspired by the vision of

internationalism bequeathed to us by India’s first Prime

Minister, the great Jawaharlal Nehru — a vision of a

world order whose pillars are peace, harmony,

cooperation and development. That vision needs to

reanimate the collective wisdom of the world

community for a new partnership to meet the

unprecedented challenges we face.