Mauritania, 2004

I

am pleased, Sir, to congratulate you and your friendly

country, Gabon, on your well-deserved election to the

presidency of the General Assembly at its fifty-ninth

session. We remain convinced that your great skills and

rich experience guarantee the success of our work. I

would also like to thank your predecessor, Mr. Julian

Hunte, who so ably guided the work of the previous

session. I should like also to express my sincere

congratulations to Secretary-General Kofi Annan and

to his entire team, on the immense efforts they have

exerted to achieve the noble ideals of our Organization.

Allow me to express our deep satisfaction at the

activities undertaken since the last Assembly session,

notably the high-level segment of the Economic and

Social Council, held in New York in June, on the theme

of “Resources mobilization and enabling environment

for poverty eradication in the context of the

implementation of the Programme of Action for the

Least Developed Countries for the Decade 2001-2010”.

My country had the privilege of hosting the

preparatory meeting for our subregion last April,

bringing together government sectors and international

partners, as well as regional civil society organizations.

We hail the efforts to define priorities and the

measures needed to implement the recommendations of

the Monterrey Conference on Financing for

Development, the decisions taken at the Johannesburg

Summit on Sustainable Development and the

Millennium Development Goals. I should note here

that those Goals will be reached only if the Group of

Eight and the other industrialized countries pursue

their joint efforts to provide greater support and

assistance to developing countries. In this regard, I

would also like to reaffirm my country’s support for

the New York Declaration on the Action Against

Hunger and Poverty.

The achievement of the Development Goals and

ensuring security and stability are closely linked to

how we address the problem of violence and terrorism.

Terrorism is a global problem, and its solution must

also be global. The fight must be based on an

intellectual and cultural vision of the complementarity

of civilizations and on an absolute rejection of

confrontation between countries.

It is important also to note the unjust disparity in

the level of development between rich and poor

countries, because poverty and social, scientific,

technological underdevelopment are among the main

causes of tension, violence and extremism. The growth

of terrorism, and its resulting fear and destruction,

obliges the international community to engage in closer

dialogue, increased coordination and a concerted effort

to face the dangers that threaten all humankind.

My country, Mauritania, firmly condemns

terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, including

the taking and killing of hostages, and we reaffirm our

commitment to combat that phenomenon, which is

alien to our society and to our sacred Islamic values,

which reject violence and extremism and which call for

dialogue, understanding, tolerance and the acceptance

of others.

It is clear that the repeated failure of the

international community to fulfil its commitments with

regard to the establishment of a comprehensive, just

and lasting peace in the Middle East and the

establishment of an independent Palestinian State

living side by side with Israel, remains the main cause

of insecurity and instability in the region and of the

growth of the extremism and violence from which we

all are suffering.

That is why it is high time that the international

community — represented by the Security Council, the

General Assembly and all relevant regional and

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international actors, including the Quartet — work

together to bring about peace and stability in the

Middle East, which, together with the rest of the world,

has suffered for so long from the destructive effects of

war.

It is high time that we implement the Arab peace

initiative, under which the Arab States guarantee

comprehensive peace and the promise of normal

relations to Israel in exchange for a complete

withdrawal from all Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese

territories up to the borders of 4 June 1967, the

establishment of an independent Palestinian State, with

East Jerusalem as its capital, and a just, consensual

resolution of the refugee issue. Clearly, there is no way

to achieve that noble goal except to carry out the peace

process and to resume the negotiations on all tracks, in

keeping with the Madrid terms of reference, the

principle of land for peace, the road map and the

relevant provisions of international law.

We are following with interest the development

of the situation in Iraq, and we reaffirm our

commitment to the unity, territorial integrity,

sovereignty and independence of Iraq and to non-

interference in its internal affairs. My country also

reaffirms its support for the brotherly Iraqi people, its

Interim National Council and its Interim Government

in their efforts to overcome the difficulties hampering

their aspirations to security, stability and the

establishment of State institutions.

We are also following with interest the

development of the situation in Darfur. We welcome

the commendable efforts of the Sudanese Government,

in cooperation with the African Union, the League of

Arab States and the United Nations, with a view to

resolving the humanitarian, security and political

aspects of the crisis. We call upon all regional and

international actors to support those efforts and to

accord to the Sudanese Government the time it needs

to honour its commitments without threats of armed

intervention, the imposition of sanctions or any

tendentious propaganda aimed at giving the Darfur

problem an ethnic or sectarian dimension. In that

regard, I welcome the positive results achieved

following the peace negotiations held at Abuja and

N’Djamena, sponsored by the African Union. I

encourage all the parties to continue the dialogue and

the negotiation process, since that is the only way to

resolve the crisis.

I now turn to Western Sahara. Mauritania

supports the efforts undertaken by the United Nations

and its Secretary-General to arrive at a definitive

settlement that brings stability to the region and enjoys

the agreement of all the parties.

My country is strongly committed to contributing

to relations of cooperation and solidarity within the

framework of our integrated regional affiliations. We

are deeply convinced of the need for the Arab Maghreb

Union, which remains an indispensable strategic option

and an ambitious project aimed at enabling the peoples

of the region to achieve greater complementarity and

solidarity. My country seeks to deepen dialogue,

understanding and cultural contacts among

civilizations through the five-plus-five approach and

the Barcelona approach.

At the level of the African continent, we

commend the solidarity and complementarity within

the framework of the organization on the use of the

Senegal River and the brotherly and friendly bilateral

relations with West African countries. My country also

welcomes the decisions taken recently by the

institutions and organs of the African Union,

particularly the formation of an African Parliament and

a Peace and Security Council, which will constitute a

framework that will enable us to transcend all current

difficulties.

At the international level, Mauritania reaffirms its

support for the People’s Republic of China as the sole

and legal representative of the Chinese people. In that

regard, we appreciate the efforts of the Chinese

Government aimed at achieving its reunification by

peaceful means.

My country has the honour to preside over the

current session of the League of Arab States at the

level of Ministers for Foreign Affairs. I should like to

stress that the Arab Summit reaffirmed at Tunis the

resolve of all Arab States to pursue the reform process

by deepening democracy, expanding political

participation and promoting respect for human rights,

the advancement of women and the understanding that

such reform must be progressive, gradual and adapted

to social and cultural traditions specific to the States of

the region, not imposed from outside.

Mauritania is pursuing its efforts in that direction

under the leadership of the President of the Republic,

His Excellency Mr. Maaouya Ould Sid’Ahmed Taya,

and continues to work to establish the rule of law, good

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governance and pluralistic democracy that promotes

human rights, freedom of expression, and personal and

general freedoms.

At the socio-economic level, we have adopted

significant new laws, such as those dealing with labour

and trafficking in persons and the introduction of broad

reforms that would enable us to make progress in

modernizing public administration to improve its

performance, liberalizing private enterprise, promoting

investment and providing basic services for our

citizens, such as education, health and potable water.

The Charter of the United Nations reflects the

common aspiration of the world’s peoples to attain

their fundamental development objectives and to

ensure international peace and security. Clearly, the

sweeping changes now taking place in the international

arena call for the reform of United Nations structures

with a view to expanding representation on the

Security Council, thereby opening it up to key regions,

such as Africa and Latin America, as well as

significant groups, such as the Group of Arab States,

and important industrialized countries that provide

substantial contributions to the Organization, such as

Germany and Japan, in order to respond to the new

changes taking place and to enable the Council, thus

restructured, to better reflect the realities and diversity

of today’s world.

We sincerely hope to see the international

community work together to consolidate international

solidarity in order to establish a new, just and more

equitable world order that safeguards peace and

security and provides a life of freedom and dignity for

everyone.