Tajikistan, 2009

At the outset, I should like

to congratulate Mr. Ali Abdussalam Treki on his

election as President of the General Assembly at its

sixty-fourth session. I am confident that his extensive

diplomatic experience and talent will contribute to the

fruitful and successful work of the General Assembly

at this session.

In recent decades, the world has made

considerable progress in terms of technology,

information and economic and social development,

which, due to globalization, is being spread throughout

the world. However, the negative aspects of this

phenomenon, such as international terrorism,

extremism, transnational organized crime, narcotics

trafficking, pandemic outbreaks and emerging

ecological challenges, pose a serious threat to the

international community. The United Nations plays the

key role in coordinating Member States’ efforts to

effectively meet the challenges of modern times and to

attain the Millennium Development Goals.

Tajikistan regards peacekeeping as one of the

most important aspects of the work of the United

Nations. Last year, for the first time ever, citizens of

the Republic of Tajikistan joined police forces in

peacekeeping operations, contributing to efforts to

strengthening peace and stability in conflict zones. A

national strategy on the development of Tajikistan’s

peacekeeping capacity is currently being drafted.

Tajikistan attaches the utmost importance to

strengthening the disarmament process. We hope that,

at the 2010 Review Conference of the Parties to the

Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, a

constructive exchange of views will take place on

urgent issues related to the practical implementation of

that agreement. We are convinced that the

establishment of nuclear-weapon-free zones is equally

important at the regional and global levels. Tajikistan

is therefore prepared to work to enhance its practical

implementation of the provisions of the Treaty on a

Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone in Central Asia, which

came into effect on 21 March 2009.

We support the leading role played by the United

Nations in combating the illicit trade in small arms and

light weapons. We hope that important measures for

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coordinating further steps in this direction will be

developed at the next Biennial Meeting to be held on

the Programme of Action.

Tajikistan supports the efforts of the international

community to achieve the comprehensive prohibition

of the use of anti-personnel mines. For our part, we are

meeting our commitments under the Convention on the

Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and

Transfer of Anti-personnel Mines and on Their

Destruction, by providing mine-risk information to the

Secretary-General on an annual basis.

The first international conference to address the

issues of the consequences of landmines was held in

Dushanbe, the capital of my country, in June 2009.

Tajikistan has long suffered the effects of landmines.

We believe that Central Asia must be free from the

threat of mines and we call upon the international

community to do its utmost to achieve this noble goal.

The international community continues to fight

terrorism, extremism, transnational organized crime

and illicit drug trafficking. These combined threats

give rise to greater concerns. We therefore consider it

essential to expedite the adoption of a comprehensive

convention on international terrorism. Double

standards must be avoided in this endeavour, since

terrorism has no national or religious affiliations.

The prevention of illicit drug trafficking is an

integral part of the common struggle against terrorism.

Tajikistan has developed bilateral, regional and

multilateral short- and long-term programmes of action,

and ratified approximately 30 intergovernmental

agreements.

The Drug Control Agency established by the

President of the Republic of Tajikistan, with the active

involvement of the United Nations, has now been in

existence for over a decade. The total value of heroin

seized during these years, in terms of its average price

in Europe, is estimated at $1.12 billion. This initiative

has helped save more than 36 million lives from drug

addiction. The Tajik initiative to establish an

anti-narcotics security belt around Afghanistan was

launched from the lofty podium of the General

Assembly at its twentieth special session in 1998.

We believe that rendering assistance to

Afghanistan’s target programmes could be one way to

counteract the drug threat emanating from that country.

Regrettably, the efforts undertaken to date and the

resources allocated by the international community to

address this challenge have not always been sufficient

to counteract the increasingly aggressive spread of

narcotics. In our view, the borders of the countries

neighbouring Afghanistan should be regarded as the

front line in this struggle, and efforts to reinforce that

line should be enhanced. For many years, Tajikistan

has acted as a buffer zone against the spread and export

of narcotics, terrorism, extremism and other negative

phenomena emanating from this area.

We are profoundly interested in strengthening

lasting peace and stability in our neighbour

Afghanistan because the security of Central Asia

depends in every respect on the situation in

Afghanistan. Today, it is obvious that the Afghan issue

cannot be resolved by military means alone, but

requires a comprehensive approach taking into account

all the many factors involved. First and foremost,

social and educational projects and programmes should

be implemented in that country. We support the current

efforts at peaceful rehabilitation and believe that the

international strategy of action in Afghanistan should

to a larger extent rely upon the Afghan people

themselves, and that priority should be given to

ensuring close and efficient cooperation with the

country’s authorities.

The world situation is rapidly changing because

of the financial and economic crisis. It not only

undermines our efforts and capacity to achieve the

Millennium Development Goals, but imposes new and

complex tasks. We highly appreciate the United

Nations role and efforts to address the current threefold

crisis and mitigate its consequences.

It is well known that the global financial and

economic crisis was caused primarily by the most

advanced and wealthy countries, which unreasonably

inflated banking assets on the basis of unsecured loans.

We therefore believe that these countries must bear

their share of responsibility towards the developing

countries, whose already difficult situation was further

aggravated by the global financial crisis. Partial write-

offs of the debts incurred during the crisis, ongoing

increases in donor assistance and rational management

of labour migration would be very helpful in this

situation. In my opinion, it is high time for a number of

forums to be replaced by practical support for the

efforts of the developing countries to mitigate and

overcome the impact of the crisis. If the crisis should

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persist over the long term, it may be fraught with ever-

more serious consequences.

Along with other Member States, Tajikistan

supported the outcome of the United Nations

Conference on the World Financial and Economic

Crisis and Its Impact on Development. We highly

appreciate the efforts undertaken by the High-level

Task Force on the Global Food Security Crisis, and

deem it necessary to enhance assistance to the

developing countries in the form of financial and

economic support and the transfer of modern

technology and seed stocks.

Meanwhile, in our opinion the efforts to solve the

problems caused by the energy crisis have not been

successful enough. We believe that, along with the

Millennium Development Goals, access to energy

should be given top priority. Tajikistan, which ranks

eighth in the world in terms of available hydropower

resources — the total amount of which is estimated at

527 billion kilowatt hours — currently utilizes less

than 5 per cent of its potential, and over the past

18 years has endured a chronic energy crisis for eight

months of every year, primarily in autumn and winter.

In recent years, the electricity shortage has been

exacerbated by abnormally severe and long winters, the

result of climate change. It is perfectly logical that, in

the absence of explored hydrocarbon resources,

Tajikistan should develop its hydropower engineering

in a concerted and comprehensive manner.

The completion of the construction of a number

of small, medium-size and large hydropower stations

will help to provide energy not only to the whole of

Central Asia, but to neighbouring countries as well. In

this regard, the implementation of such regional

projects as the Central Asia-South Asia Electricity

Transmission and Trade Project will define the

development prospects of our vast region, which

includes Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan and

Pakistan.

The ever-increasing need for cost-efficient and

environmentally sound energy requires the construction

of hydropower stations and water reservoirs, which are

essential to providing reliable volumes of water,

especially in years of drought. As hydropower facilities

generate energy by utilizing water rather than by

consuming it, hydropower engineering plays an

important role in developing energy production and the

socio-economic sphere, as well as in environmental

protection not only in Tajikistan but in the entire

Central Asian region.

Global climate change requires a comprehensive

and integrated approach to the use of natural resources.

We are deeply convinced that the Copenhagen meeting

of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations

Framework Convention on Climate Change will

endorse a new comprehensive agreement on this issue.

Every year, natural disasters cause severe damage

to agriculture, the environment and the entire economy

of countries such as ours. In Tajikistan, 93 per cent of

the terrain consists of mountains. The damage done to

our country’s economy in recent years by such natural

disasters as mud flows, landslides and floods is

estimated at hundreds of millions of United States

dollars. Tragically, that damage entails human

casualties.

An assessment of the impact of climate change on

Tajikistan’s glaciers has shown that, during the period

of observation begun in 1930, the total area of the

glaciers has been reduced by approximately one third.

Since glaciers and snowcaps are the main sources for

water runoff into the rivers, there is a probability that

in the near future river capacity will be diminished by

5 to 15 per cent. At the same time, water consumption

has increased, due to demographic growth and the

expansion of areas of irrigation. In the previous

century alone, the total area of irrigated land increased

from 2.5 million to 9 million hectares, while the

population of Central Asia grew from 20 million in

1956 to 63 million people today. In these

circumstances, the countries of the region should

review their programmes and strategies with regard to

water use, especially in agriculture, and take

consolidated and concerted action to promote

sustainable development.

From this lofty rostrum, we should like once

again to remind everyone of the problems caused by

the degradation of the Aral Sea. The large-scale use of

land for cultivating such agricultural crops as cotton

and rice, which consume a great deal of water, has

become the primary cause of this ecological disaster.

The most reasonable solution to the current

situation, which is characterized by the salinization of

soil and the irretrievable loss of 30 to 60 per cent of

irrigation water, would be to adopt specific water-

saving measures, such as the rehabilitation of irrigation

systems, the reclamation of irrigated land, the

7 09-52228

introduction of advanced irrigation technologies and

the partial replacement of cotton and rice with crops

that consume less water, which would also help to

address the food crisis issue.

Only an integrated and mutually beneficial

approach of the countries of the region towards the use

of water energy and other natural resources can help to

resolve the interrelated energy, food and environment

problems and to ensure the sustainable development of

all Central Asian countries. It is no secret that

humankind is already facing a shortage of safe

drinking water, which is not accessible to more than

1 billion people on the planet, while in some countries

the price of freshwater currently exceeds that of petrol.

As a country that has one of the largest amounts

of freshwater resources in the world, Tajikistan is

convinced that creating an economic mechanism for

the cross-flow of water and energy resources between

upstream countries that are rich in water resources and

downstream countries where hydrocarbon deposits are

primarily located would promote long-term mutually

beneficial cooperation among those States.

Having put forward the idea of using safe

drinking water from Lake Sarez to meet the needs of

the population of the entire region, we propose specific

measures in that area. We hope that the United Nations

and other international organizations, regional

commissions and relevant institutions can offer

constructive and unwavering assistance on that issue,

which is of utmost significance to our region.

As the initiator of the International Year of

Freshwater 2003 and the International Decade for

Action, “Water for Life”, 2005-2015, Tajikistan

believes that it is of paramount importance to expedite

the implementation of the United Nations water agenda

and to enhance it by achieving the Decade goals. World

Water Day on 22 March 2010 will mark the fifth year

since the commencement of the Water Decade. In that

regard, Tajikistan proposes holding on that day a high-

level dialogue of the General Assembly to discuss the

implementation of the international water Decade and

the Millennium Development Goals on water and

sanitation. That event could be a milestone in the

midterm review of the implementation of half of the

Decade and evaluation of the progress in achieving the

Millennium Development Goals.

My Government has already put forward a

proposal to hold a conference for a midterm review in

Dushanbe in 2010 that would serve as one of the

preparatory events for the United Nations millennium

review summit in 2010. I hope that that initiative will

find understanding among and receive support from all

Member States.

Bearing in mind the water crisis, which has been

aggravated by population growth and global climate

change, the international community should take

specific measures to ensure the fair and integrated use

of water resources in order to meet the needs of the

people, environment and economies of all countries

around the world. To that end, the Republic of

Tajikistan has proposed declaring 2012 international

year of water diplomacy, with the aim of developing,

within the United Nations, further coordinated steps

towards the rational use of water resources at the

national, regional and international levels. Our country

intends to further promote that issue at the General

Assembly, and hopes for the support of all Member

States.

Next year will mark the beginning of the third

five-year term on the way towards the international

community’s achieving the Millennium Development

Goals. The year 2010 will be a landmark in the

assessment of our efforts to meet global challenges,

overcome difficulties and evaluate the progress in

attaining the goals outlined in the United Nations

Millennium Declaration.

In conclusion, I would like to stress that, as an

advocate of broad-based cooperation, Tajikistan

believes that only collective and coordinated efforts

and effective regional and international cooperation

can serve as a foundation for our common success in

that area. The mutual understanding and cooperation

that have prevailed in this Organization since its

establishment remain the only way to a bright and clear

future and to universal peace and prosperity.