Nauru, 2014

Allow me to congratulate

Mr. Sam Kutesa on his assumption of the presidency

of the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth session.

Let me assure him of my delegation’s full support and

cooperation as he steers our work during this session. I

must also commend his predecessor, Ambassador John

Ashe, for showing such capable leadership during the

previous session. He led the small island developing

States (SIDS) through several important milestones

during his tenure, including the International Year

of Small Island Developing States and the recently

concluded International Conference on SIDS in Samoa.

It has been said that the stars are aligned with SIDS

this year. Ambassador Ashe has been our brightest

beacon, and I thank him very much for that. Let me

also thank another champion of the SIDS, Secretary-

General Ban Ki-moon. Indeed, earlier this year, I

sat in the Trusteeship Council Chamber when the

Secretary-General helped us celebrate the launch of the

International Year of Small Island Developing States.

Showing a remarkable understanding of our unique

circumstances, he said:

“The International Year offers us the

opportunity to celebrate the rich cultural heritage

of the people of small island developing States and

to honour their many contributions to our world.

It is also an opportunity to highlight the various

needs and challenges of this diverse coalition.

Some small island developing States have enjoyed

long-lasting stability. Others are in transition. Some

are economically more fragile than others... Others

are extremely vulnerable to the immediate effects

of climate change. But all small island developing

States share a common understanding. We need to

set our world on a sustainable path.”

The challenges of SIDS are many. One need only

glance at the headlines to appreciate that they join a

long list of concerns that the international community

must confront today: naked brutality, pestilence,

poverty and the worsening impacts of climate change,

to name only a few. I understand the impulse for us to

put off hard decisions to another day, prioritize some

over others, or even bury our heads in the sand. But

the General Assembly is and remains the pre-eminent

forum for grappling with global crises, and the United

Nations is our best hope for solving them.

However, if we are to be successful, we must

acknowledge a reality that lies beneath so many of those

challenges, namely, that we live in an interconnected

world and that the actions of one country or region

impact the lives of people half a world away. Conflict,

poverty and disease can send refugees across borders

and oceans and sometimes all the way to our shores.

We can no longer escape each other. As the Secretary-

General also remarked, we all share the same island.

Also, we must consider my country’s connection

to the ocean. As for so many SIDS, the ocean is the

foundation of our culture and economy, and we depend

on its bounty for food and income. Yet the reckless

actions of other nations have severely undermined the

marine environment on which we so depend — from

excessive greenhouse gas emissions that warm the

planet and make the seas more and more acidic to

irresponsible overfishing, the outright stealing of fish

in our waters, and dangerous pollution, the effect of

which we have yet to fully comprehend.

All the while, some of those same countries

responsible for the damage are also charged with

assessing the well-being of the marine environment.

How can we be confident that our interests will be

protected in that effort? We, as a developing country,

are constantly facing demands for greater transparency

and accountability from the same actors that downplay,

and sometimes even cover up, their own transgressions.

Finding lasting solutions to problems such as

those will require more resources and a level of

cooperation that the international community has

so far not countenanced. It will also require us to

look at the failings in the global order that somehow

prevent countries such as mine from accessing the fair

economic benefits of our own resources. Nevertheless,

we cannot just stand by and do nothing. We cannot and

should not wait for others to decide what is best for us.

For that reason, the parties to the Nauru Agreement

are taking the lead in successfully managing their tuna

stocks through such measures as curbing illegal fishing

and sustainable harvesting.

The President has wisely chosen “Delivering on and

implementing a transformative post-2015 development

agenda” as the theme of the general debate of the

sixty-ninth session. It goes to the heart of the central

task before us — not only fulfilling the long-standing

promises with regard to sustainable development but

also engendering a paradigm shift in the way that we

achieve such development. The current piecemeal

approach, where a donor’s political interests determine

aid priorities, may treat symptoms for a time, but it fails

to address the underlying disease.

If we want our efforts to be successful over the

long term, we need to build a foundation that develops

global citizens and gives them the tools they need to

succeed in a global world. In other words, we must

move beyond capacity-building to institution-building.

What is needed is long-term in-country engagement,

backed by real resources, that produces durable

domestic institutions run by nationals. We cannot let

new and emerging issues distract or diminish work on

core priorities that remain inadequately addressed. We

may be experiencing our own fatigue when we again

raise the issues of overfishing, climate adaptation and

water treatment, but those are often the areas most in

need of attention.

I know that tackling all of those problems will be a

tall order and may seem quite daunting, I am absolutely

confident that this institution and its agencies are up

to the task. We have made some progress in reducing

hunger, poverty and disease. And just this week, the

world watched as leaders gathered at the Climate

Summit to announce the actions that their countries and

corporations are planning in order to lower greenhouse

gas emissions responsible for the climate crisis. The

Summit provided hope that, at least in some corners,

serious climate action is imminent. However, it was

hard to ignore the fact that most announcements were

about the greenhouse gas reductions that would occur

under some future Government a decade or more in the

future.

What is more, SIDS, which contribute only a

fraction of global emissions, have undertaken to build

sustainable economies while announcing some of the

most ambitious pledges to cut emissions. For example,

we are working closely with the International Renewable

Energy Agency, through their Lighthouses initiative,

to achieve our own goal of a 50 per cent reduction

in 2020. My own regional group, the Pacific SIDS,

led the General Assembly to formally recognize the

connection between climate change and international

peace and security in 2009 and helped convince the

Security Council to do the same in 2011.

But, while few countries doubt the correlation

between climate change and conflict today and despite

graphic examples of such in the past few years alone,

there is still disagreement as to the way forward.

Therefore, we are still of the opinion that the Secretary-

General should appoint a special representative on

climate and security to analyse the projected security

impacts of the crisis. In addition, the Secretary-General

should lead a joint task force of all relevant organs

and specialized agencies to assess the capacity of the

United Nations system to respond. That is the least we

can do as an international body to prepare for one of the

biggest challenges of our generation.

If the Security Council is to remain relevant, it

must be adaptive enough to meet the latest threats, and

climate change is a clear and present danger that we

ignore at our own peril. The Security Council must also

reflect new geopolitical realities by becoming more

representative and inclusive. It is for that reason that

Nauru supports the reform of the Security Council by

enlarging its permanent and non-permanent categories

and making its working methods more efficient. New

members should be more geographically diverse,

but they must also be willing to broaden their vision

beyond a narrow focus on domestic interests to include

a commitment to the common good of all Member

States.

Similarly, the United Nations should ensure that all

citizens of the world have the opportunity to participate

in its activities. It must work for the 10,000 people in

Nauru and other small countries, and it must not continue

to ignore the 24 million people in Taiwan, who time

and again have demonstrated a commitment to peace

and regional cooperation. Nauru is pleased to note that,

with solid international support and the cross-Strait

rapprochement, the Republic of China has increased its

meaningful participation in United Nations specialized

agencies and mechanisms. We continue to encourage

the positive interaction between the two sides of the

Taiwan Strait in the international arena. Furthermore,

I would like to recognize the contributions that Taiwan

has made to help my country make progress towards

its national sustainable development strategy. I take

the opportunity to also express my country’s deep

appreciation to our friends and partners who continue

to support our sustainable development priorities,

including Australia, Russia, New Zealand, the European

Union, Cuba, Israel and Turkey, to mention a few.

The world is rapidly changing, and the new realities

have strained the ability of the United Nations to

respond adequately. Long-term solutions will require

a new commitment to providing adequate means of

implementation. On climate change alone, we are far

from the goal of providing $100 billion a year by 2020

to help nations adapt to climate impacts that are now

unavoidable and to build sources of clean energy, to say

nothing of the 0.7 per cent gross domestic product goal

for development aid.

I know that we, as an international community, face

numerous crises on many fronts and that much is being

asked of us. But I strongly believe that it is in times

like these that solutions to even the most intractable

problems emerge from the human spirit. It is in times

like these that light emerges from darkness; hope from

despair.

The small island developing States have laid out a

vision to help us reach our full potential. I invite our

partners to invest in our peoples, and we will build

a better and more secure world. The United Nations

remains our best hope for people everywhere to live

in peace and prosperity. My faith in it has never been

stronger. God bless the Republic of Nauru and God

bless the United Nations.