Nauru, 2001

I bid the Assembly welcome

from the people of Nauru, the pleasant little island of

the Pacific. Let me avail myself of the opportunity to

extend to you, Sir, my Government’s belated

congratulations on your assumption of the presidency

of the fifty-sixth session of the General Assembly.

Much of the work of the United Nations since the

despicable attacks on the United States of America on

11 September has been focused on counter-terrorism,

and this is understandable. The Security Council’s

adoption of resolution 1373 (2001), obligating

Members to implement anti-terrorist measures, should

recognize the importance of supporting existing

regional initiatives in the fight against terrorism. To

this end, we welcome the undertakings by the Security

Council Committee on Counter-Terrorism.

The World Bank has predicted that the events of

11 September will exacerbate the already gloomy

global economic outlook. Its ripples will be felt across

all of the world’s regions, particularly in countries

dependent on tourism, remittances and foreign

investment. It is thus critical that the Security Council

allow the competent bodies of the United Nations to

assess the costs of extending, expanding or adding new

peacekeeping operations before their implementation.

Nauru joins the international community in

offering our belated but heartfelt congratulations to

Mr. Kofi Annan and the Organization on being the joint

recipients of this year’s prestigious Nobel Peace Prize.

The former President of the General Assembly,

Mr. Harri Holkeri of Finland, has to be commended for

capitalizing on the momentum generated by the

Millennium Declaration.

My delegation is pleased to endorse your

proposed agenda, Mr. President, for the fifty-sixth

session. The work of the General Assembly should be

relevant to the tasks at hand, but at the same time it

should address long-standing issues affecting the

efficiency and status of this body. Meaningful

cooperation between Member States must always be

encouraged across the boundaries of religion, ethnicity

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and culture. The recent World Conference against

Racism is a stark reminder of how the work of the

United Nations will otherwise continue to be

frustrated; but the one significant area where the

United Nations has made little or no progress is on the

question of the reform of the Security Council. We

would therefore support a proposal to move the process

to a higher level and to deal with the complex issues in

a step-by-step fashion.

The last meeting of the Pacific Islands Forum

leaders was held in my country a few months ago. The

communiqué of that meeting has been circulated as a

document of the United Nations. In that communiqué

the Forum leaders sought to formalize cooperation

arrangements between the United Nations and the

Pacific Islands Forum. I would like to take this

opportunity to kindly request your support of the

relevant draft resolution.

The issues of climate change and sea-level rise

continue to be of major concern to my country, and we

have repeatedly voiced our deep concern about the

adverse impact of human-induced climate change,

especially on the low-lying atolls around the Pacific.

We have stressed the importance of efforts to build

appropriate human and institutional capacity.

The Kyoto Protocol represents a significant step

forward on the path to taking action to combat climate

change, but unless significant action is taken on a

practical compliance regime, there is little prospect of

any outcome being enforceable.

Nauru therefore looks forward to participating

with the rest of the world in Johannesburg next year to

review the progress made since Rio, and it is our

fervent hope that the Kyoto Protocol will have come

into force by then.

There is a special urgency for Nauru. Economic

growth in our small country has been negative for more

than a decade, and, as reflected in recent revisions of

our classification by the United Nations and the United

Nations Development Programme, our per capita

income has fallen by almost 80 per cent since the

1980s. We look to the international community, the

United Nations and its various agencies to assist us

through these difficult times and to help secure a safe

future for our children.

Our region, the world’s very first nuclear-free

zone, has a long history of supporting disarmament and

non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, born of the

region’s harsh experience with nuclear testing by

colonial Powers. The Pacific Islands Forum leaders

have again expressed their desire for the entry into

force of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty.

Nauru will be depositing its instrument of ratification

today, and I call on other States to follow suit.

The trans-shipment of radioactive material and

MOX fuel, through our exclusive economic zones is a

continuing concern, but we are committed to pursuing

our concerns constructively and vigorously at the

appropriate political level.

Nauru’s commitment to the international effort to

combat money-laundering is unwavering. Our

Parliament passed anti-money-laundering legislation in

August of this year to correct the deficiencies in our

regulatory and administrative arrangements. However,

Nauru is disappointed not to have graduated from the

list of special non-cooperating countries despite the

fact that the legislation was drafted in close

collaboration with Financial Action Task Force on

Money Laundering (FATF) regional representatives.

We will nonetheless continue to work on satisfying the

key players in FATF on this issue, and we look forward

to working with our regional partners under the Pacific

regional action plan being developed.

Nauru, along with 20 other Member States, again

supported the inclusion of a resolution on the

admission of the Republic of China on Taiwan on the

agenda of the fifty-sixth session. While the attempt

failed, Nauru will not be discouraged from continuing

its efforts to correct this anomaly. We on Nauru

wholeheartedly believe that the Republic of China on

Taiwan has a part to play in this Organization, and its

people should not be denied a voice in this world body.

We note with pleasure the recent admission of the

Republic of China on Taiwan to the World Trade

Organization.

Finally, I wish to end my statement by revisiting

the issue of security and terrorism. It is indeed sad that

as we meet here today, there is a war going on in the

world - a war against terrorism. Prior to the horrific 11

September attacks on the United States of America, my

Government, at the request of the Government of

Australia, agreed to the use of Nauru as a refugee-

processing centre. We made this decision on

humanitarian grounds. As a consequence, we now have

on Nauru nearly 800 asylum seekers from Afghanistan,

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Iraq and Palestine — 10 per cent of the whole

population of Nauru — along with migration personnel

from the United Nations, the International Organization

for Migration and Australia. The asylum seekers are

now being processed.

I have taken it upon myself to personally visit the

camps from time to time and to mingle with these

unfortunate people, and on several occasions have sat

down and broken bread with them. I found that they are

like you and me. They are brave human beings seeking

a better life for themselves and their children and

escape from the oppression back home.

The resources of the United Nations need to be

augmented to cope with this humanitarian tragedy, and

the international community needs to urgently tackle

the problem in a coordinated manner, not only in terms

of providing assistance and refuge where possible,

but also in terms of addressing the sources and causes

of refugees, people- smuggling and terrorism.

Understanding and responding will not necessarily

solve the problem, but it will make it easier for

Governments to share in the continuing international

effort that will be needed.

Finally, may I say that the good old days, before

11 September, are gone forever, and I shed a tear. The

sad part is that we inherited a world that was good

from our forefathers. Today, I ask, do we leave

tomorrow a better world for our children and our

children’s children? That I ask. Mr. President, we look

to you for leadership on these vital issues.

Thank you. May God bless those in sorrow. May

God bless the United States of America. And may God

bless the United Nations.