Liechtenstein, 2003

Let me first pay

tribute to the commitment and the courage of the

Special Representative of the Secretary-General, Sergio

Vieira de Mello, and all the United Nations staff

members who lost their lives in the unprecedented

attack on United Nations headquarters in Baghdad. The

date of 19 August is engraved in the consciousness of

the international community and in the annals of the

United Nations. We were forced to face a fact that we

have not tackled with the necessary determination in

the past: the vulnerability of United Nations staff

worldwide. While legal protection can certainly not

prevent an attack such as the one of 19 August, we

must nevertheless provide the best possible protection

in this respect. We therefore hope that the General

Assembly will take the necessary measures to make the

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United Nations Convention on the Safety of United

Nations and Associated Personnel more effective.

The process that led to this engagement of the

United Nations in Iraq constituted a major crisis for the

existing mechanisms dealing with threats to

international peace and security, first and foremost the

Security Council. This Organization is subject to and

dependent on the political will of its Members. Its

distinctive quality lies in the fact that it provides

legitimacy in accordance with international law. This

outstanding quality it must not lose, and we are all

challenged to stand up for this core function of the

United Nations, which is a good part of its raison d''tre

in today's world. The crisis the United Nations has

gone through in connection with the action taken

against Iraq will not be overcome simply by adopting a

pragmatic approach in dealing with the aftermath

thereof. We welcome the ongoing discussions in the

Security Council on a stronger and more meaningful

role of the United Nations in Iraq. At the same time,

there must also be a recognition that international law

continues to be the foundation for our actions in

dealing with problems of international peace and

security and that the rule of law needs to be applied

both at the national and at the international levels.

Like any other State, in particular small States,

Liechtenstein attaches the highest possible priority to

the rule of international law expressed, inter alia, in

our commitment to the International Criminal Court

and international relations that are based on rules

derived from international legal standards. The United

Nations, as the core body for drafting and adopting

those standards, must continue to play its role in

defending and upholding them.

It is more obvious than ever that the Security

Council is facing a particular challenge in this respect.

While discussions in the media, in the academic world

and in think tanks after the military action against Iraq

invariably have focused on the theme of the need for

quick and effective Security Council reform, this sense

of urgency was lost on the Open-ended Working Group

on Security Council Reform the very body that has

the competence to make decisions on such reform.

After 10 years of debate on this issue, we all appreciate

the difficulties attached to it, and they are indeed big.

However, these difficulties are not sufficient

justification for our failure to resolve an issue that

everybody agrees is a major obstacle to the effective

functioning of the Organization as a whole. It was

therefore rather disturbing to see the Open-ended

Working Group continue engaging in business as usual,

while the world the world we are supposed to

represent, after all unanimously called for effective

and comprehensive reform.

The composition of the Council is clearly a

reflection of a geopolitical reality that ceased to exist a

long time ago and enlargement thus continues to be an

indispensable element of a meaningful reform of the

Council. At the same time, there is also a clear need to

address other issues, such as the mechanisms for

decision-making and in particular the implementation

of Security Council resolutions whether adopted

under Chapter VI or Chapter VII and issues of

legality. We hope that the initiative the Secretary-

General presented last week will contribute to making

the main organ that is at the centre of the world's

attention a more effective and representative body.

While the work on Security Council reform has

been slow and unsatisfactory overall, it has

nevertheless produced some important and positive

results. The Council has opened up to the membership

as a whole and increasingly engaged in open debates,

both on thematic and on other issues of concern to the

membership as a whole. Liechtenstein welcomes this

development and has participated in many of those

debates.

This increased openness of the Council, however,

does not resolve the issue of its accountability. The

effectiveness and credibility of the Council will be

much enhanced if it bases its decision-making on a

dialogue with the States on whose behalf it acts. In the

recent past, the Council has made some decisions that

were controversial and others that were of

unprecedented reach. Some of the measures taken in

connection with financial sanctions impact directly on

the lives of individuals who have no means of bringing

their grievances stemming from such decisions to the

attention of the Council. Since the Council makes its

decisions on behalf of the entire membership and since

their implementation is mandatory for all Member

States, there should be ways for all Member States to

express the concerns they might have with regard to

such decisions. The appropriate body for such

discussions is obviously the General Assembly, the

only main organ of the organization of universal

membership.

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When educating people about the United Nations,

we keep stumbling upon one issue: The need to explain

that the United Nations is not identical with the

Security Council. The fact that the Council is seized

with the most burning issues and the most pressing

international crises is only one part of the explanation

for this fact. The flip side which we must no longer

ignore is the increasingly futile struggle of the General

Assembly to play its rightful role in accordance with

the Charter of the United Nations. An overburdened

agenda, sterile debates, an overflow of documentation

and the routine adoption of resolutions, that are but a

rehash of past resolutions, have a combined devastating

effect on the relevance of this body.

The General Assembly is today paralysed to a

point that keeps it from dealing with the politically

crucial issues and from acting in a quick and flexible

manner. A good illustration is the resolution in which

the General Assembly condemned the attack on the

United Nations headquarters in Baghdad. Even though

everybody shared the shock and dismay about this

vicious attack, it took the General Assembly almost a

month to adopt the said resolution.

The current state of the Assembly sadly plays into

the hands of its detractors. Presiding over the General

Assembly is a very difficult task, Mr. President. If you

are able to lead this Assembly out of its established

routine of paying lip service to its own reform and if

you are able to initiate the radical reform this body so

desperately needs, you will have created a lasting

legacy, and we will support you.

Much has been said about the crisis in which the

United Nations finds itself after this difficult year.

However, every crisis is an opportunity, and I hope that

the Assembly will take up its work in this spirit. Very

rarely over the past few years has the public interest in

the United Nations been greater than it has over the

past 12 months. We must ensure that the peoples of the

world continue turning to the United Nations as the

place where established rules are upheld, new

challenges are tackled and effective and responsible

action is taken collectively.