Jordan, 1996

Permit me at the outset, Sir, to extend warm congratulations

to Mr. Razali on the confidence shown in him by the

international community in electing him President of the

General Assembly at its fifty-first session. I take this

opportunity to extend my best wishes to him and to the

other members of the Bureau for success in directing the

meetings of this session and in all endeavours to strengthen

our Organization and promote peace in our world. I also

congratulate Mr. Razali’s friendly country, Malaysia.

I also take this opportunity to express my thanks and

appreciation to his predecessor, Mr. Freitas do Amaral, and

the former members of the Bureau for their effective

stewardship of the fiftieth session.

I also wish to express our gratitude to the Secretary-

General, Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, for the dedicated

efforts he has sincerely and honestly made to advance the

Organization and to promote its humanitarian mission of

settling disputes between States by peaceful means. In

conformity with the decision of the League of Arab States,

Jordan supports the extension of the Secretary-General’s

mandate for another term, in order to enable him to

pursue his mission and efforts in the service of

international peace and security and the reforms he has

initiated in the organs and Secretariat of the Organization.

The role of the United Nations and its specialized

agencies in the protection of international peace and

security and in enhancing and directing the world

economy towards liberalization and integration are among

the main reasons for my country’s devotion to the

Organization and adherence to its Charter. In view of this,

and out of our sense of responsibility and concern for the

efficiency and relevance of the Organization, we appeal

to all Member States to continue to support it, to fulfil

their obligations to it consistently and to work to resolve

its financial crisis.

I assert my country’s firm position on the need to

implement the necessary administrative reforms and

restructure the Security Council. The structure of the

Council no longer reflects the current balance of power.

Any expansion of the permanent membership of the

Council should take into account the increase in the

number of developing countries and the growing

economic power of certain industrial nations, such as

Germany and Japan. We have seen many plans and

proposals on this matter which the Security Council

should carefully consider, such as the Italian plan. A

review of the veto power enjoyed by the permanent

members should reflect the democracy and transparency

we seek.

In this context, I must emphasize the need to review

the question of economic sanctions, which neither

distinguish between a political entity and its innocent

unarmed civilian population, nor provide compensation to

third States adversely affected by such sanctions. We

must work together to create a durable formula. We also

call for opening the membership of the United Nations to

all peace-loving States, as stipulated in Article 4.1 of the

Charter.

This international Organization has made worthy

peacekeeping efforts in many countries. It has made

human sacrifices that would be unfair and unwise to

ignore. Jordan is very proud to have been among the first

countries participating in the peacekeeping forces in the

former Yugoslavia and elsewhere. In this regard, my

country’s effective participation in the Implementation

Force’s peacekeeping and peacemaking operation in

Bosnia is noteworthy.

8

In this regard, the fraternal people of Bosnia must be

congratulated on the Dayton Agreement and on the

elections it has held. A special tribute should be paid to

President Alija Izetbegovic´ for winning the presidential

election. We are ready, along with other peace-loving

countries, to help the people of Bosnia make the new

democratic experiment a success, consolidate and rebuild

the federal State and promote its reconstruction,

development, sovereignty and stability.

Before I move on to another international issue, I

would like to congratulate the United Nations on opening

the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty for signature.

My country is proud to have been among the first countries

to sponsor the draft resolution under which this Treaty was

adopted and to have signed it. We hope that steps towards

nuclear disarmament will continue and will encompass the

Middle East region. We hope that negotiations will begin

for the conclusion of a treaty in the very near future

banning the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction,

nuclear and otherwise, so that a nuclear-weapon-free zone

may be established in the Middle East.

The peoples of our region have suffered the agonies of

devastating wars over the past five decades, wars which

have caused the deaths of tens of thousands, destroyed

basic infrastructures and brought the people of our countries

bloodshed, pain, deprivation, poverty and instability. Due to

the allocation of resources to the war machine and the

terrible arms race, their economies have gone into

recession.

Signs of hope, however, emerged for these people five

years ago with the Madrid Peace Conference in October

1991 and the subsequent bilateral and multilateral

negotiations between Arabs and Israelis. Palestinian hopes

were revived with the 1993 Oslo agreement. The

Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government

Arrangements that followed restored happiness and hope to

millions of Palestinians, who saw in that agreement the

beginning of the end of their pain, bloodshed and destroyed

economy. They were newly optimistic about securing their

right to self-determination within their own State, rebuilding

their national economy, industry and infrastructure, which

had been destroyed by wars, and the onset of peaceful trade

relations with their neighbours in Jordan, Israel and other

countries of the region. Hope was also rekindled by the

peace treaty concluded between Jordan and Israel in

October 1994 and the resulting bilateral agreements on the

establishment of diplomatic and economic relations,

bilateral and regional cooperation, the reconstruction of the

region and the establishment of strong trade and economic

relations between the two countries, to the benefit of their

peoples and other peoples in the region, opening the way

to comprehensive regional cooperation.

Concrete progress was also made on the Syrian-

Israeli and Lebanese-Israeli peace tracks. There were

prospects for a Syrian-Israeli agreement based on the

“land-for-peace” principle, providing for full Israeli

withdrawal from the Golan in return for a peace

agreement ending the state of war and paving the way for

peaceful relations based on strong foundations of

understanding and normal, peaceful coexistence.

Current events and negative factors and measures in

the occupied Arab territories — a return to the settlement-

building policy; the violation of the sanctity of the holy

places; the closure of the territories; the denial of work

opportunities; the refusal to implement the agreements

signed on the Palestinian-Israeli track; the postponement

and impediment of self-government negotiations; the

unilateral determination of the status of Jerusalem and of

the self-government negotiations; the refusal to resume

negotiations, suspended seven months ago, with Syria and

Lebanon; and the refusal to return to the terms of

reference and framework of the Madrid Peace

Conference — have given rise to frustration among the

peoples of the region, who are beginning to lose the

rekindled hope to which I have referred.

Despite the excessively negative slogans against

peace used by the new Israeli Government during the

electoral campaign, we in Jordan — the King, the

leadership and the people — welcomed the new

Administration and the newly-elected Prime Minister out

of respect for the free will of the Israeli people and non-

interference in their internal affairs. We called for the

continuation of the comprehensive peace process in the

region and pledged to utilize the peace treaty with Israel

to establish such a comprehensive peace. We urged our

neighbours, Syria and Lebanon, to deal with the new

realities and the new Israeli Government positively and

realistically. Our motto and position at the Arab Summit

Conference held at Cairo last June was a call to extend

more time and opportunity to the new Israeli Government

to return to the peace process on the bases agreed upon at

the Madrid Peace Conference: the “land-for-peace”

formula and the implementation of Security Council

resolutions 242 (1967), 338 (1973) and 425 (1978).

All the participants in the Madrid Peace Conference

had believed that the success achieved on the Palestinian-

Israeli track and the Jordanian-Israeli track had opened to

9

the peoples of the region, including the Israeli people, the

door to a new life and a better future based on the

principles of justice, peace for all, peaceful relations and

trade. They had also believed that this success proved once

again how misguided and wrong are obsolete principles

such as that of achieving security through force and thus

through the imposition of forced solutions. It also debunked

the principle of occupying other people’s land by force to

ensure one’s own security. Indeed, it has become clear that

security can be ensured only through dialogue, peaceful

coexistence, negotiations, mutual respect among peoples

and free economic and trade relations, rather than through

power politics and the imposition of forced solutions. Yet

once again we are hearing certain nervous calls to revive

the obsolete theory of security and the imposition of

solutions by force.

Amid the gloom that has begun to enshroud the peace

process, there is still a ray of hope. It is up to us, both

Arabs and Israelis, to keep it shining with a view to

securing a better future for our children and our

grandchildren. For if, God forbid, we allowed this hope to

become lost, a renewed cycle of violence, instability,

tension, terrorism and extremism would prevail in the

region, as shown by the recent bloody violence.

At the Cairo summit, all Arab Governments expressed

for the first time their collective support and blessings for

the peace process and proclaimed that peace is an

irreversible strategic option. We have heard similar pledges

from the new Israeli Government. It is our sincere hope that

the United States and Russian co-sponsors of the peace

process will intervene, and that international efforts will be

made to put the peace process back on track, restore its

previous vigour and impetus and put an end to all the

obstacles that might impede or disrupt it.

The war and destruction in the region and the peace

process that followed it have been described as a series of

missed opportunities; for in the past all of us have missed

invaluable opportunities for peace. Now here we are again,

about to return to that insane policy. By challenging the

opponents of peace, President Arafat and the Palestinian

leadership have demonstrated a serious and unambiguous

desire to achieve a just, comprehensive and lasting peace.

It is not wise to reward him by embarrassing him before

the Palestinian people and placing him in an unenviable

situation vis-à-vis the opponents of peace, who are betting

on the failure of his policies and the failure of the peace

process.

Nor is it prudent to stipulate that Syria and Lebanon

must return to the negotiating table without preconditions,

as though the Madrid Conference and the painstaking and

tough negotiations that followed had never taken place.

Does this condition itself not constitute a precondition for

the peace process? We all declared our intention to

nurture the magnificent baby born at the Madrid

Conference, whom we named “the peace process”. But

then, we disagreed on the method to be followed in the

baby’s upbringing. Let us return to working together, so

as not to kill the baby in its cradle and along with it our

peoples’ chances for the better life which shone on the

horizon after decades of death and destruction.

One of the most important factors for the credibility

of the Middle East peace process is the improvement in

the living conditions of the population through increased

investment which has resulted in lowering the high

unemployment rate. We in Jordan have taken numerous

measures, enacted legislation and concluded agreements

with a view to protecting and promoting investment. I

regret that despite these reassuring measures and

guarantees and the convening of two international

economic summit conferences — in Casablanca in 1994

and in Amman in 1995 — the real outcome in terms of

investment in the region has been disappointing. Apart

from the increase in tourism that we noticed following the

signing of the peace treaty, foreign industrial investment

remains very low notwithstanding the many profitable

projects put forward at the recent Amman economic

conference.

While private foreign companies may have an

excuse for reluctance to invest, because of fears related to

the regime’s history and political situation, the

Governments of developed industrial countries have no

excuse for their failure to provide their insurance

companies with sufficient guarantees against investment

risks to encourage companies to increase their

investments. This is particularly true since the increased

profitability of these companies’ investment projects and

the resulting higher incomes in the recipient developing

countries would benefit the economies of the developed

industrial countries as well. In this regard, we have high

hopes for the successful conclusion of the fourth

economic summit, to be held in Cairo next November.

This will provide another opportunity for foreign investors

to contribute to the region’s development and to the

consolidation of peace — quite apart from the benefits

they and the economies of countries are bound to reap.

10

One of the region’s biggest and most complex

problems is that of Palestinian refugees; its settlement has

been deferred to the final status negotiations. It is

regrettable that the international community has not yet

given this important political and humanitarian problem the

attention, understanding and assistance it deserves. Every

year we receive the report of the Commissioner-General of

the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine

Refugees in the Near East, in which he describes the

Agency’s budget deficit and the consequent need to reduce

the level of services provided to the refugees.

We urge the wealthy industrial States to give this

matter their fullest attention and to increase their

contribution in order to ensure the survival of this

temporary solution to the major humanitarian problems that

affect over 3.5 million Palestinian refugees, including some

1.5 million who live in Jordan. The Government of Jordan,

despite its limited resources, is compelled to provide

assistance and relief worth approximately $300 million

annually. It is necessary to provide support for the

Agency’s budget to enable it to continue its work

effectively, pending a final solution of the refugee problem

on the basis of United Nations resolutions providing for

their repatriation or compensation. As long as it remains

without a substantive and effective solution, this problem

will continue to constitute a time bomb — forgive me for

using this term to indicate the magnitude of this problem —

for the peace process, in view of its significant

humanitarian and political dimensions.

The subject of peace in the Middle East leads us to

demand speedy implementation of the recent agreement

between Iraq and the United Nations for a partial lifting of

the embargo on the sale of Iraqi oil in order to provide

food and medicine to the brotherly people of Iraq, who

have suffered, and continue to suffer, from the economic

sanctions imposed on Iraq. These sanctions have punished

them but have not affected their leaders. We call upon the

Government of Iraq to implement United Nations

resolutions; respect the sovereignty, independence and

freedom of neighbouring States; cooperate with the United

Nations Special Commission; cooperate in the release of

Kuwaiti prisoners of war held in Iraq; respect human rights;

and establish a democratic system in which the rights of all

its communities are respected. At the same time, we call for

the lifting of the economic sanctions that are punishing the

people of Iraq. We also call for respect for Iraq’s

sovereignty and territorial integrity and non-interference in

its internal affairs. We reject any attempts aimed at dividing

Iraq, such as the recently proposed “safe areas” scheme.

It is also our hope that the United Arab Emirates

will be able to arrive at a peaceful solution enabling it to

regain its three Gulf islands occupied by Iran. We call for

non-interference in the internal affairs of Bahrain and

extend our support to that sister country, at a time when

it is the target of terrorism. We call upon Eritrea to find

a peaceful solution to the question of its withdrawal from

the Yemeni Huneish islands in response to Yemen’s

peaceful efforts, in order to maintain good-neighbourly

relations and in gratitude for Yemen’s assistance to

Eritrea in attaining its independence and sovereignty.

We call for a just and speedy solution to the

Lockerbie problem, and for a positive response to the

initiatives and efforts of the League of Arab States, the

Organization of African Unity, the Non-Aligned

Movement and the Organization of the Islamic

Conference, which would ensure the trial and punishment

of the perpetrators of that heinous terrorist act without

punishing all the people of Libya.

My country supports international efforts to combat

international terrorism. Hence our active participation at

the Sharm el-Sheikh summit, held earlier this year at the

invitation of our sister country, the Arab Republic of

Egypt, to explore the most effective means of

international cooperation in this regard. We also support

the decisions of the latest summit meeting of the Group

of Seven industrial Powers aimed at fighting terrorism

and punishing its perpetrators, as terrorism has become a

dangerous international phenomenon that has taken the

lives of many innocent people, destroyed the

infrastructure of many countries, disrupted tourism and

the free movement of innocent people and defamed

national liberation and independence movements. We

therefore support bilateral, regional and international

cooperation to combat this ugly and destructive

phenomenon.

Today the world stands on the threshold of a new

century, only three years away. That historic occasion

must not pass without our pondering and studying the

events of the twentieth century in preparation for the

coming twenty-first century. We should benefit from the

lessons we have learned and the events we have

witnessed in order to make the next century a safer, more

secure, stable and developed one for future generations.

An idea worthy of exploration and careful examination in

this regard is that of holding, at the outset of the new

century, a special session of the General Assembly at the

Heads of State level, to prepare for a new world order in

whose shaping all States, large and small, developed and

developing, would participate. This is only an idea which

could be further elaborated and considered.

As the representative of a developing country, it

concerns me that despite the great progress achieved in the

areas of disarmament and the resolution of global security

problems, there has been no resolution of the problem of

the economic security of the developing States. The gap

between the developed and developing countries in the

areas of income and technology is growing. Small

developing countries will not be able to find solutions in

the foreseeable future to their heavy burden of persistent

indebtedness. It is both disastrous and painful that many

developing countries, such as my country, Jordan, give their

full efforts to consolidate and develop their democratic

systems, orient their economies towards privatization,

reform their economic systems, redress their budgetary and

balance-of-payment deficits, fully cooperate with the World

Bank and the International Monetary Fund and make

concrete strides in this respect, and yet find themselves,

after their people have devoted all their resources,

capabilities and productivity to servicing and repaying their

burdensome debts, still striving breathlessly to catch up

with the developed countries, without hope of soon ridding

themselves of this burden. Therefore, the shaping of and

preparation for any new world order to be developed must

consider the important question of the economic security of

the developing countries.

We now live in a world where distances between its

various places and economic markets have been reduced

due to tremendous technological strides in the areas of

transport and communications. This means that the

development and well-being of the developing countries is

an important part of the solution to the recession in the

developed countries. The idea of holding a special session

of the General Assembly to prepare for a new world

economic order could be the subject of a draft resolution

which I hope will be brought before this Assembly for

consideration.