Ireland, 1993

I should like to congratulate

Mr. Insanally on his election as President of the General

Assembly at its forty-eighth session. While opening our

session, he rightly reminded us of the hopes now placed in

this universal forum - to which we welcome six new

Members - and of the growing need for what he described

as a collective vision of our future.

Allow me to convey to the Government and the people

of India the deepest sympathy of the Irish people for the

victims of the earthquake.

We meet here at a time of great hope for the peoples of

the Middle East. Years of bitter antagonism and conflict

have yielded to agreement and, we hope, reconciliation

between the two great historical traditions in an area that has

seen far too much bloodshed. The signature of the

agreement in Washington was an act of the highest

statesmanship and courage. It deserves a commensurate

response from the other countries of the region and from the

international community.

I welcome President Clinton’s speedy initiative in

convening today a conference on aid to Palestine. We in

Ireland stand ready to play our part, together with our

partners in the European Community. We will increase

substantially our aid to the West Bank and Gaza, and we

will take steps to strengthen and develop our good relations

with Israel and with the Palestinian people.

It is also a time of great hope for the people of South

Africa. When the prisoner of Robben Island, Nelson

Mandela, states, in Afrikaans to an Afrikaner audience, that

what is done, is done, and looks to a shared future for all

South Africans, it sends a powerful message to all of us.

A new South Africa is in the making. We have waited

and striven long for this day. I am happy to announce that

we in Ireland have decided to establish diplomatic relations

with that new South Africa.

It is a time of hope, but also of apprehension,

particularly for the people of Russia. The course of reform

is not yet complete. I am confident that the way forward

identified by President Yeltsin will continue to be endorsed

by the people so that Russia may continue on the path to

stable democracy and sustained economic development.

The recent changes in international life have brought

great and lasting benefits to many: to those who endured

authoritarian forms of government for decades and have now

gained the freedom to exercise their basic human and civil

rights; to peoples released from the super-Power competition

that enabled dictatorial and repressive regimes to act with

impunity; to the wider international community that no

longer lives under the threat of global nuclear conflagration.

Yet the optimism that characterized the early days of the

post-cold-war period has been tempered by the realization

that for every advance in the Middle East or in South Africa,

there is an Angola, or a Yugoslavia, a Somalia, a Sudan.

For all our progress, thousands continue to die in brutal

wars, thousands more suffer from gross abuses of human

rights and millions are denied their basic right to food, water

and shelter. There is still a great distance to be travelled to

a world of justice, equality and true respect for the

individual.

People look here, to the United Nations, to help them

travel that distance. Faced with this hope, this expectation -

this demand - our Organization today must meet challenges

of a kind that it has not had to cope with in the past,

challenges qualitatively different from the international and

regional disputes that have traditionally absorbed so much of

the United Nations energies.

We are coming to understand better the interrelated

nature of these tasks: the struggle to end war; to advance

democracy; to promote economic development; to protect the

dignity of the individual; to ensure freedom and the rule of

law; to protect the environment; to deal with the problems

of population - all are part of the same effort. Success in

one requires progress in others.

We are coming to understand too that the activities of

States and Governments require the broader cooperative

context of the United Nations. As our problems are

transnational, so too must be our response.

The fact is that we need a United Nations whose

organization and decisions truly represent the will of the

international community. We need a United Nations whose

activities truly address the great contemporary challenges,

and we need a United Nations that is not hindered by lack

of resources in personnel and finance.

At no time in its history has the need to re-examine and

strengthen the United Nations system been greater or more

Forty-eighth session - 1 October l993 31

widely felt, and these themes of representation, relevance

and resources are at the heart of the debate about the reform

of the United Nations.

As the body charged with the primary responsibility for

international peace and security, it is imperative that the

Security Council should function well and with authority.

The Council’s response to the huge demands that have been

made of it in recent years has been impressive. The number

and scope of its decisions are greater than ever before, and

the import of those decisions for States and for peoples

everywhere is more far-reaching.

And yet, we must ask if the Council truly represents the

almost universal membership of the Organization and

reflects fully the great changes that have taken place in

economic and political relations. These are questions of the

deepest significance for international cooperation, but I

believe that unless they are addressed now, the political

authority of the Security Council and its capacity to act

decisively and with confidence will be eroded.

Ireland therefore supports the case for an increase in the

membership of the Security Council. I hope that decisions

on this can be taken before the fiftieth anniversary of the

United Nations in two years’ time.

There is a need also for greater transparency in Security

Council decision-making. The general membership, though

it takes no part in the Council’s decisions, is bound by them,

and we are frequently called on to supply personnel and

finance to implement the Council’s expanded and

increasingly complex mandates. We must work for a more

interactive relationship between the Council and the General

Assembly, and for more frequent and substantive reporting

by the Council to the general membership. And we must

look for ways to make the Assembly itself more effective.

It is ironic that for most of its existence, when the

United Nations was not always deemed to be the appropriate

forum for the resolution of major disputes, the Organization

was for the most part adequately resourced. Yet today,

when the demands for action by the United Nations have

reached unprecedented levels, when ideological division no

longer inhibits an effective United Nations role and when the

approach to problem-solving at Security Council level is

essentially cooperative, the Organization finds itself

burdened with a grave and crippling financial crisis.

The Secretary-General has told us that the Organization

is living from hand to mouth. He warns us that the financial

situation could soon prevent the United Nations from

discharging its essential responsibilities and undermine its

political will and practical capacity to undertake any new

activities. And yet the simple truth is this: for every dollar

that the United Nations spends on the instruments of peace,

the world spends almost $2,000 on the weapons of war.

It is simply not acceptable to call on the United Nations

to undertake new responsibilities while declining or failing

to provide the necessary resources. A significant

improvement in the Organization’s finances is now an urgent

priority. I appeal to all Member States in arrears, and

especially those on the Security Council, to comply with

their financial obligations under the Charter. This is a moral

as well as a practical imperative.

The impact of change is particularly apparent in the

area of peace-keeping. In almost every crisis, on every

continent, United Nations forces are deployed on

increasingly varied and complex tasks. By the end of this

year the numbers in the field may total 100,000. And

individual operations are now very large: nearly 20,000

each in Cambodia and Somalia; almost 25,000 in former

Yugoslavia. Ireland now participates in 10 of the 14 United

Nations peace-keeping operations in the field. A significant

proportion of our armed forces is at present engaged in

United Nations peace-keeping duties.

But, beyond the scale of the operations, the nature of

the tasks undertaken by United Nations forces has changed

also. The initial decision to intervene militarily in Somalia

for humanitarian purposes and the subsequent decision to

mandate the United Nations Operation in Somalia

(UNOSOM) to take enforcement action are new departures

for the Organization. And they present new challenges for

troop-contributing countries. In Ireland’s case we had to

change our law to enable our forces to take part in the

Chapter VII operation in Somalia.

It is important for all of us - the United Nations, the

troop contributors, and those whom we seek to help - to

reflect carefully on our experiences and draw the lessons

from the new large-scale operations in Cambodia, Somalia

and Yugoslavia.

It is evident that existing structures both at United

Nations Headquarters and in the field have come under very

considerable strain. The mandates of major United Nations

operations are now multi-faceted. We need mechanisms that

will allow such mandates to be carried through in a manner

that is effective, transparent and humane. I want to mention

two points in particular here today.

32 General Assembly - Forty-eighth session

The first is the imperative need to maintain peace -

keeping and peace-enforcement operations within an overall

political framework and to exploit every opportunity for

reconciliation. Enforcement action, when it is undertaken -

and I accept that it may be necessary - should be the

minimum required and it should be carefully directed to

achieving the political aims of the operation. For this

reason, I believe that at the time the Security Council takes

a decision to establish an operation, particularly one

involving peace enforcement, it should pay special attention

to the issues of command and control.

Secondly, there is a need to improve military planning

at United Nations Headquarters and to ensure that the best

military advice and information is available to the

Secretary-General in his conduct of peace-keeping

operations. To this end, an effective planning unit is

required. Thought should also be given to whether the

Military Staff Committee, which is provided for in the

Charter but which has never functioned effectively, could

have a contribution to make.

In Somalia, the overriding objective of the United

Nations operation must be political reconciliation and

national reconstruction.

There have been outstanding successes. One year ago,

several hundreds were dying each day from hunger and

malnutrition. Today, as a result of the work of the Unified

Task Force (UNITAF), UNOSOM and the non-governmental

organizations, people are no longer dying from man-made

famine. A year ago violence was widespread. Today almost

all of Somalia is calm.

The exception is south Mogadishu, where the efforts of

UNOSOM have been continually frustrated and many,

including 60 United Nations peace-keepers, have lost their

lives. In pursuance of its overall aim of political

reconciliation, the United Nations must continue its search

for a peaceful resolution in Mogadishu, learning from and

building on its success elsewhere in Somalia.

Most of the conflicts that this Assembly will address in

the coming weeks are marked by massive abuses of human

rights - summary executions, torture, detention, rape,

mutilation. And even outside of these open conflicts the

dignity of the individual is frequently violated by

authoritarian and repressive regimes. At Vienna in June, the

World Conference on Human Rights sought to strengthen the

protection of human rights worldwide. Most of us who

attended that meeting came away feeling that progress had

indeed been made. It is essential that the agreed Programme

of Action be given the highest priority and acted on by this

Assembly. A United Nations commissioner for human rights

should be appointed. The resources devoted to human rights

activities in the United Nations system should be doubled.

The United Nations human rights machinery, especially in

relation to the protection of women, should be strengthened.

And we must make decisive progress on the establishment

of an international criminal tribunal to prosecute persons

responsible for violations of humanitarian law wherever they

occur.

The abuses of human rights in Yugoslavia have

provoked a profound determination in the international

community that those responsible must be brought to justice.

The ad hoc approach, unavoidable in the case of Yugoslavia,

points to the need for a permanent international criminal

tribunal with an established jurisdiction and an identified

body of applicable law. The General Assembly at this

session should examine the valuable work done on this topic

by the International Law Commission.

We can take advantage of the changed international

situation to pursue our work on disarmament and arms

control. We must intensify our efforts to halt the spread of

nuclear weapons. I am heartened by the decision of some

nuclear States to maintain a moratorium on nuclear testing

and I call on others to do the same. Our objective must be

a comprehensive treaty banning nuclear testing forever.

Ireland has proposed that the United Nations should

elaborate a code of conduct for conventional arms transfers

which would encourage States to exercise responsibility and

restraint in their arms transfers and which would set out

common principles to be observed in this area. We believe

that, as the international community moves towards a closer

understanding of its shared responsibility for international

security in the framework of the United Nations, such a code

would represent an important step forward in the area of

arms control.

Last year Ireland called for an agenda for development

that would complement and stand alongside the

Secretary-General’s "Agenda for Peace". We are pleased

that such a report is now in preparation. Our vision of the

future cannot ignore the images of deprivation and need we

see every day from all too many parts of the world. The

reality of this suffering is a test for all of us. The Irish

Government is committed to doubling the percentage of

gross national product devoted to official development aid in

the period 1993 to 1997. Peace and development are not

separable.

Forty-eighth session - 1 October l993 33

We must recognize what the Secretary-General has

called the humanitarian imperative. The international

community must be assured that the United Nations and its

development agencies will respond quickly to emergencies

as they occur. The creation within the Secretariat of a new

Department of Humanitarian Affairs has been a useful step

towards that end.

The international community must look squarely at

certain incontrovertible features of our shared existence on

this planet: climate change, a possible doubling of the

world’s population by the middle of the next century,

pressures imposed by our patterns of production and

consumption, great imbalances in the availability of

technology and resources. In many of these areas, the Rio

Conference and its Agenda 21 have identified the way

ahead. I am pleased that the Commission on Sustainable

Development and other organs provided for in Rio are off to

a promising start.

We must acknowledge that the issues we address under

the auspices of this Assembly and those which arise in the

General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the

Bretton Woods institutions cannot be separated. In all of

these areas, our aim must be a peaceful, integrated

international society in which our sense of the common good

increasingly qualifies considerations of national power and

immediate expediency.

As the dramatic developments in the Israeli-Palestinian

relationship and the equally historic changes in South Africa

have shown, progress is possible even in the most obdurate

of conflicts if the protagonists are willing to look towards a

common future.

Northern Ireland represents a challenge of similar

dimensions to the British and Irish Governments and to the

peoples of both islands. Some would say that the conflict is

fundamentally incapable of resolution. I do not accept that,

and I will not accept it. Like the vast majority of my

compatriots, I yearn for peace on our island.

I want to see a comprehensive settlement which will

enable men, women and children to go about their daily

lives in peace and without fear. All of us in both islands are

paying the price of past political failures. We should not ask

future generations to bear the cost of further failure.

I have no illusions about the complexity of the issues.

I know that there are no easy or quick solutions - no single

step that can remove the necessity for a long and painstaking

journey. But I believe that, with sufficient good will and

determination, the Irish and British Governments and the

leaders of the constitutional parties in Northern Ireland can

lead the people they represent out of the stalemate which

exists at present towards a peaceful and secure future. As

I have said elsewhere, the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle are all

to hand if only we can find the right way to fit them

together.

The Irish Government is ready to play its full part in

this. We will bring to any resumed talks the resources of

good will, flexibility and imagination which we believe all

participants must display if a new agreement is to be

achieved.

It is painfully obvious that all traditional approaches

have failed and that new thinking is urgently required. For

our part, we are willing to look afresh at our own traditional

assumptions and at our relationships with others to see if

there are new approaches which can open a way forward.

We are ready to accept the need for radical and innovative

compromise as part of a new accommodation which will

bring lasting peace and reconciliation to the island of

Ireland.

Compromise does not mean asking either of the two

traditions in Northern Ireland to modify its fundamental

beliefs or, indeed, to suppress its objectives. It does mean

asking each tradition to recognize that the other deserves

equal respect and must be accommodated on equal terms.

It means accepting that diversity can be enriching rather than

threatening and that both traditions in Ireland must find a

way to share the island on a basis of partnership and trust.

Peace and stability will not be found in any political

system which is imposed, or which is rejected by a

substantial part of the population who live within it.

What we need in the island of Ireland is a collective

will to rise above traditional suspicions and animosities and

a readiness to look beyond areas of disagreement to areas

where we can work together to mutual advantage.

Peace is now the imperative, and the continuation of

violence is the single greatest obstacle to the realization of

our hopes. An end to violence would open up new

possibilities and allow all of us to emerge from the shadow

of a very troubled history.

It would, at last, help to clear the way for compromise

and negotiation, leading to an agreement which would

achieve a fair and lasting accommodation between

nationalism and unionism in Ireland. We must lift our sights

34 General Assembly - Forty-eighth session

to the new horizons of possibility which developments in the

Middle East and South Africa have opened for us. This is

the objective of the Government which I represent. I believe

we can have no higher objective.