Paraguay, 2006

Madam President, may I tell you how happy Paraguay

is to see you presiding over the sixty-first session of

the General Assembly. Your personal and professional

qualities ensure the success of this session.

I wish to reiterate what I said at the earlier

summit meeting. For Paraguay, peace and security,

development with social justice, democracy and human

rights are the fundamental pillars on which the world

must be based, because they are interconnected

principles that mutually strengthen each other. We

cannot consider ourselves to be in an airtight

compartment, because if pride of place is given to one

over another, this Assembly will not be a pluralistic,

representative body. Rather, the single-voiced will of

Powers will continue to be imposed on others.

My delegation thanks the Secretary-General,

Mr. Kofi Annan, for his detailed annual report on the

work of the Organization (A/61/1). Ideally, the

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Secretary-General would not travel only to those places

where barbaric warfare is destroying cities and killing

innocent, defenceless people. Perhaps something would

change if he were also to go to see the vast universe of

poverty and social exclusion resulting from worldwide,

profoundly unjust disorder, and then propose solutions.

We urgently need to build a global partnership of

solidarity to supplement the efforts made by our

countries. Only in this way will we be able to deal with

the problems of poverty, hunger and the lack of access

to education and health care. Clearly, every country is

responsible for achieving its own economic and social

development by applying the proper policies to

mobilize domestic resources. But those national efforts

should be supplemented by explicit commitments by

the developed countries to promote and facilitate

access to international markets and more balance in

economic relations and in the price of products.

The experience of developed countries

themselves shows that, without external cooperation,

they would have had difficulty in prospering or in

restructuring their economies.

The reciprocal increase in production and trade is

a driving force for development. However, the trend

towards more concentrated productive expansion and

insufficient participation in the benefits of world trade

condemn the majority of countries to marginalization

from development. For this reason, Paraguay calls once

again for the right of all nations to more even-handed,

equitable treatment, including the right to build a new

form of solidarity among States which are capable of

promoting progress on a global scale.

Agricultural subsidies, protectionism, the lack of

technology transfers and the distortions in international

trade, together with ethnocentric control of

information, knowledge and science, postpone

development and punish countries on the periphery

with a pre-modern and wasted life. Because of those

recurrent circumstances, we are convinced that the

tariffs and non-tariff barriers that are applied not only

by developed countries but also by our own regional

partners must be removed. Only in that way can we

quickly overcome asymmetries and unjust

discrimination.

Society expects more of democracy and of

politicians. It expects the system that guarantees liberty

and equality before the law also to be a system which

promotes and ensures the well-being of all and puts an

end to exclusion. Unfortunately, this basic conception

of politics is not reflected in the behaviour of many

actors. In practice, petty interests, selfishness and party

faction are considered more important and have greater

priority than the interests of the nation. Democracy as

government in the service of the common good is being

bastardized. That gives rise to the lack of prestige and

devaluation of politics and democracy, particularly in

Latin America.

This erratic direction that politics is taking must

be corrected in countries which do not have a

democratic tradition: we have only just built low-

quality democracy, a pseudo-democracy laced with

conspiracies against good governance and the exercise

of power based on legitimacy and the will of the

majority of the people.

In any event, in Paraguay, we are making a great

effort. School attendance is showing exponential

growth. Educational reform, now extended to higher

education, has practically universalized basic

education. The secondary school population is

following the same trend, while university enrolment

has doubled through the institutionalization of equal

opportunities and conditions. According to the United

Nations itself, Paraguay is in a position to achieve, for

example, the Millennium Development Goal related to

education. One of our key objectives here is to gain

certification of zero illiteracy for our country by 2008.

Together with improving and significantly

expanding public and private health-care services, our

environmental policy is recovering the great ecological

sustainability which characterized Paraguay. This is

taking place in the midst of silent agrarian reform. In

addition to the massive purchase of land for orphan

peasants — which is still insufficient to alleviate the

unfair distribution of land in Paraguay — we are

implementing a policy aimed at rural settlement and

increased production and productivity as a way of

giving fresh significance to peasant life, its

sustainability and its dignity.

Positive action is also taking place with a view to

modernizing the State through simplification,

transparency and making its services effective. We are

seeking to improve public safety, combat corruption

and eradicate piracy, drug trafficking and smuggling. If

one looks at the crime index, Paraguay has one of the

lowest rates. Nevertheless, we are obliged to improve

legal security, and to do that we must implement a

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policy of professional qualification and establish ethics

in the judicial system.

Development financing continues to be limited in

terms of fulfilling national development plans and

programmes, both those which are the result of

international mobilization and those which result from

the domestic mobilization of financial resources. This

situation reflects the viability of various projects which

are directed towards expanding productive

employment, improving basic social services,

education and adapting productive infrastructure and

other areas of action which are essential for

development.

We are aware that the main task begins within our

countries. It is we who bear the main responsibility.

However, with the increase in domestic savings, good

macroeconomic policies and a predictable country, we

in Paraguay are reducing poverty and are moving

towards development. Therefore, our country continues

to focus on rationalizing public expenditure and on

social and productive investment. This fiscal discipline

makes us worthy of increased support from

international financial institutions. But what we need in

Latin America, as the President of our sister Republic

of Bolivia said earlier today, are markets and partners,

not bosses or others who would continue to seize the

wealth and natural resources of the peoples of our

region.

On the subject of human rights, we welcome the

fact that, through a process of focused consultations,

the General Assembly, in March, adopted resolution

60/251, which established the Human Rights Council.

That Council will have a mechanism for the periodic

and universal review of States’ compliance with their

obligations in this important area, a review based on

dialogue and cooperation. What we want is that the

criteria for assessing human rights be applied in the

same way and using the same principles both to

developing countries and to developed countries. The

assessment of human rights would thus not affect only

developing countries and countries with emerging

economies, which are making great efforts at

institution-building and at consolidating democracy

and freedom.

The fight against terrorism should unite people

who love liberty and seek respect for human rights and

the rule of law. While it is true that fundamentalism of

all kinds is anachronistic and dangerous, terrorism

should not be the only item on the international

agenda, excluding or relegating to the back burner the

equally crucial debate on poverty and development in

countries with peripheral capitalism and those with

emerging economies. Civilization means respect for

diversity and differences. Combating terrorism thus

requires that any repressive action be carried out within

the jurisdiction of international law and not through

mere administrative procedures.

With regard to the question of the representation

in the United Nations of the 23 million inhabitants of

Taiwan, Paraguay, consistent with the position it has

long held, confirms its support in favour of their

admission to the United Nations. Their inclusion is

consistent with the principle of universality embodied

in our Charter, as well as with the norms of

international law.

To address the problems and conflicts now facing

the international community, it is necessary to create a

multipolar world and to make it function. The

equilibrium of our twenty-first-century universe replete

with uncertainty, depends on multipolarity. For that

reason, my country and the Common Market of the

South (MERCOSUR) place their hopes on that

approach, and in particular on the reform of the

Security Council. It is shameful that what occurs in the

Council should be seen as more important than the

United Nations as an Organization which promotes a

culture of peace, global development and the

universalization of science and technology.

In Latin America, as was said by my friend the

President of our sister Republic of Bolivia, we have a

culture of peace and brotherhood. We seek harmony

with our fellow human beings and with nature.

Unfortunately, at other times in our history, we have

experienced warfare — not because our peoples

wanted it, but because of manipulation by imperialists

thirsting to destroy our wealth and fragment our

peoples. We have put that history behind us. Today we

look to the future to see how we in our region can pool

our efforts to deal with poverty and recover our

peoples’ political, economic and cultural sovereignty.

In addition, the hierarchy and institutional

structure of the United Nations depend on a world

where equilibrium prevails, ensuring fairness in

decisions and action. We do not need sermons about

education for peace and the megamillions spent on the

arms build-up. We are not naïve and were offended to

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see that in 2004 alone, the super-Powers spent sums of

money on rearming that could have put an end to

poverty and ignorance in the world.

Certainly military belligerence, which is so

destructive and so threatening, is not unrelated to the

scandalous rise in the price of oil today, which is

causing insecurity, economic slowdown and stagnation

in the developing countries. Inequality for our peoples

should not mean that we must take bread out of the

mouths of the poor in order to waste millions of dollars

on fratricidal weapons.

Over and above the events that threaten world

peace are the daily lives of people. In our region, life is

good only for the minority and miserable for the

majority.

Therefore, we urgently need a United Nations

that makes a contribution to the development, well-

being and freedom of all peoples. Likewise, it is our

duty to build an entirely prosperous, fair and united

society so that the countenances of our citizens reflect

their happy lives. May God illuminate our path, so that

there can be brotherhood among all nations and

individuals, and so that our history can truly embark on

the path of peace.