Palau, 2004

This is a momentous

year for our country as we celebrate, on 1 October, the

tenth anniversary of our independence and our

membership in this institution. Palau was the last

country to emerge from the Trusteeship System, having

been administered by the United States under the

supervision of the United Nations longer than any

country in the world. It was the United Nations that

provided Palau with a willing forum in which to

express and ultimately achieve our right to sovereignty,

and for that we are ever thankful. I am also happy to

observe, on this tenth anniversary, that this year we

established, for the first time, a permanent mission in

New York so that we can enhance our ability to meet

our international responsibilities.

It was the United States, through its

administration and willing cooperation during our

peaceful emergence into independence, that assured us

the liberty and the values that guide us today. For that

extraordinary legacy, we today express our deep

gratitude to the United States of America.

This is a good year for Palau to deepen its

involvement, since it coincides with the worldís

preparation for the Mauritius conference and the

increased emphasis at the United Nations on the unique

challenges facing small island developing States.

While images of swaying palm trees and white sand

beaches prevail in the world's imagination, they are

only part of the story. In truth and in fact, the

remoteness and the isolation of Palau make it a very

difficult place to develop a self-reliant economy,

provide medical care and education to its people and

deter aggression and terrorism. Fuel and transportation

prices are among the highest in the world. After four

successive colonial administrations, our infrastructure

is quite incomplete, and our most promising hope for

the development of a sustainable economy, our pristine

environment, is threatened by factors beyond our

control, such as the failure of all industrialized

countries to reach agreement on implementing the

Kyoto Protocol.

We have created a democratic society and

ensured human rights for our people, but without

international focus, we will not be able to provide hope

and opportunity to our children, and we will continue

to watch as they leave their homeland to seek an

education and a career elsewhere. For no matter what

statistics may be advanced, what references to gross

national product may be debated, until we can provide

our children with the incentive to stay and help build

our country, we will have lost. Thus, the Mauritius

process is critical for Palau, and we trust that the

developed countries of the world will embrace it.

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Similarly, we trust that United Nations agencies

will sharpen their focus on the small island developing

States and correct what we view as a current

imbalance, in support of the fragile small States of the

world. We applaud the recent efforts of the Global

Environmental Facility (GEF) to streamline assistance

to Palau through the creation of an innovative North

Pacific subregional programme that will build our

capacity to protect our environment and create a

sustainable economy.

We are troubled, however, by a growing tendency

in the donor community to demand that small countries

like ours prove our capacity before assistance can be

delivered. This is a catch-22 situation that threatens to

halt our development. The only way we can build our

capacity to execute projects that will save, for example,

our unique biodiversity is to experience the hard work

of completing projects and learning from our

experience.

This observation does not mean that we are

reluctant to accept the obligations and responsibilities

inherent in receiving assistance. We are willing and

eager to be monitored by the international community

in our performance. We firmly believe that we should

be held accountable for the quality and the

transparency of our efforts.

It is ironic that tiny countries such as ours, where

so many of the worldís environmental treasures exist,

are denied the assistance they need due to a perceived

lack of capacity to navigate the unwieldy bureaucracies of

the international organizations charged with protecting

those very treasures.

As already noted, the failure of the world to come

to agreement on implementing the Kyoto Protocol will

contribute to the destruction of our marine and

terrestrial resources. Palau, like many other small

island developing States, is a window on the worldís

future in this regard and must be carefully observed.

We urge the GEF to create real funding opportunities

for adaptation and mitigation measures in a proactive

and streamlined fashion before it is too late.

In a similar vein, we are increasingly aware of the

particularly damaging fishing practice of deep-sea

bottom trawling. Increasingly employed on the high

seas as coastal fisheries are depleted, this technique

entails dragging heavy equipment along the seabed,

completely destroying established coral, sponge and

related communities that have taken centuries to

develop. We are a culture of fishing people and find

this practice unacceptable. As we participated with our

Pacific colleagues in eliminating drift-net fishing some

years ago, we now call upon the world to join us in

declaring a moratorium on deep sea bottom trawling

before this practice does any more irremediable damage.

Last month, Palauís accession to the Group of

Asian States created the largest regional grouping in

the United Nations. Two critical issues involving our

Asian region also have great global significance.

First, for the United Nations to be effective at

ensuring international peace and security, all nations,

large and small, should be represented in its

deliberations. The Republic of China on Taiwan should

no longer be kept on the sidelines of the most

important international Organization. The principle of

universality should be applied so that the 23 million

people of Taiwan can bring their talents, their energy

and their principled democratic positions to the

organizations, bodies, specialized agencies and

programmes of the United Nations, thereby aiding the

rest of the world in pursuing our mutual agenda.

Secondly, and also in pursuit of the most effective

means to strengthen the credibility of the United

Nations, Palau urges the United Nations to reform the

Security Council to reflect the reality of the

international community in the twenty-first century so

that countries that play a major role in the maintenance

of international peace and security always participate

in the decision-making process of the Security Council.

Palau believes that the Security Council should be

expanded to include additional developing and

developed countries as new members, and that Japanís

stellar record of contribution is a solid basis for Japanís

assumption of permanent membership of the Security

Council. Japan has been a leader in international

initiatives for many years, and it is for that reason that

Palau takes this strongly felt position.

Much of my presentation today has focused on

the enormous threats to vulnerable island States like

Palau. We agree with the Secretary-General, who

observed in his opening remarks to the high-level

segment of the twelfth session of the Commission on

Sustainable Development, held at United Nations

Headquarters from 28 to 30 April 2004, that ìhigh-

level political attention has been diverted from

sustainable development by the recent emphasis given

to terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and the war

in Iraq. But Palau also understands that the scourge of

global terrorism and its immoral violence against

innocent people must be defeated. We are proud of our

sons and daughters serving in the United States

military. Only last week, one of those sons, a Marine

fighting side by side with Coalition forces in Iraq, paid

the ultimate price, marking the first death of a Palauan

in the struggle with global terrorism. Our forces are

small in number but, like Corporal Ngirmidol, large in

loyalty, commitment and idealism. No one should

make any mistake about that.

Palau is grateful to the United States for allowing

us to achieve our independence and thus to join the

international communityís quest for world peace.

Nonetheless, a balanced international agenda which

includes a determined focus on sustainable development

is required if Palau is to achieve some measure of

economic self-reliance, and if the world as we know it

is to survive.