Uruguay, 2001

I

want first of all to stress that, under the current

circumstances, our presence — everybody’s

presence — at this general debate unquestionably takes

on special significance.

Every year, the United Nations prepares and

submits to Member States for their consideration a

comprehensive agenda containing many items of varied

scope and nature. This session is no exception: the

United Nations will not stop.

Yet, many things now appear completely

different. The city of New York, the United States and

every country, and the people of the United States and

every people — all of humankind — have been cruelly

attacked by terrorism, and its threat hangs over every

one of us and over natural and peaceful relations

among the peoples of the world. In short, this is a

global phenomenon that demands of us a global answer

and that has marked the start of the new millennium.

The nations of my continent believe that to be so. The

statements made by the Presidents of Brazil and of

Mexico, which I endorse, made that perfectly clear.

The Millennium Summit, which brought us

together here last year, provided an opportunity for us

to identify the issues that affect us all and that we must

face as part of a challenge that no one can avoid. It

19

defined an agenda of peace and hope for a world

affected by common problems, although, it must be

said, in different ways.

Today, we face a new scenario. Perhaps as never

before, all of us, and hence the United Nations, have a

common goal: to respond to terrorism, irrespective of

boundaries, ideologies, religions, races and cultures.

That commitment, undertaken with responsibility,

involves taking every possible action without ever

forgetting the higher goal: peace, whose supreme

guarantee must continue to be international law and the

conventions and treaties to which we are parties.

But there is no doubt that such a commitment is

not enough. We must fight every form of terrorism at

every level, domestic and international, and on every

front — legal, military, security and intelligence,

administrative and management. This demands of us

strong conviction, confidence in our shared values,

faith in humankind and the affirmation of life as the

highest value.

Terrorism is blind and wicked by definition.

Blind because it does not conceive or communicate

goals shared by the rest and so plunges into

irrationality. Wicked because it indiscriminately

destroys people and property and sows fear, anxiety

and sometimes panic.

Nevertheless, to fight it it will also be necessary

to move against other enemies of peace, such as

poverty and underdevelopment, to give every person

good reason to live and to make all of us guardians of

humankind, which is a common good from which no

one must feel excluded, and for which we must fight

unwaveringly.

There is no cause or banner that could justify this

violence. That is precisely why we must prevent

marginalization, helplessness and desperation from

taking root in people’s souls so that they look

approvingly and complacently on the criminal actions

of which we are victims.

Our task, then, is to galvanize everyone’s spirit in

the struggle against terrorism, because terrorism not

only fails to help solve the problems afflicting society

as a whole but also fills it with fear and plunges it into

paralysis and confusion.

We move with ever greater determination towards

a world and, consequently, towards a society that is

evidently more and more globalized. The events of 11

September demonstrate that very clearly. Every people

and every Government has been affected by those

events.

We are all involved in what happens, in a more

profound way than ever, because what happened not

only affects the security of the people; it raises

questions that are much simpler, but the answers to

which are complex: what are all of our lives going to

be like from now on? What is the life of my family

going to be like? Of my children? Of my parents? And

of the others, my neighbours, my friends? How will the

simple acts of my life change? Will I be able to travel,

receive letters, use transportation and cross bridges —

without second thoughts, as was natural to us before?

This world and, in particular, the United Nations

face a challenge for which they are not duly prepared.

We have created the technological and communication

means to unify the planet and globalize it. But we

neither know how nor have the proper instruments to

properly manage this process.

We are living through an amazing revolution, and

it must be guided — driving it forward if it stalls,

limiting it if it goes too far — in order to achieve the

goals enabling the structuring of a new, balanced

international system that takes into account the changes

that have occurred for humankind over the last 50

years.

The United Nations was born as a response to a

world that today no longer exists. The instruments and

institutions it created in the past were a response to

past realities — replaced today by new realities — in

the political, demographic, cultural, religious and

ecological spheres.

All the many countries that make up this global

society and that, together, navigate through space, have

the obligation of confronting this new reality, drawing

on our diversity.

Uruguay, a small country, but one with a long

international tradition — it was a participant in the

1907 Hague Conference to implement arbitration as the

method for resolving conflicts, a member of the League

of Nations and a founding Member of the United

Nations in San Francisco — feels that this is our

current situation, and we are ready to shoulder our due

share of responsibility.

In the past, we created international financial and

monetary institutions, and others for international

20

trade, such as the World Trade Organization, which is

meeting today in Doha. All these institutions govern

our activities and determine what we must do. But they

never act in concert. While the world is global, their

decisions are sectoral or singular.

While loans are granted to us or fiscal or

monetary adjustments are required of us, the doors to

markets do not at the same time open to our products

and our labour. This way, instead of participating in the

process of globalization, we are closed in nearly sealed

compartments. Those who have attained a certain level

of growth grow even more, while the rest, save a few

exceptions, suffer losses and fall further away from the

levels that would make it possible to enjoy the

necessary prosperity.

Today the planet has 6 billion inhabitants. Only

1.1 billion of them live in developed areas. In 2050, not

long from now — my grandchildren will not yet have

reached my age — the planet will have 9.3 billion

inhabitants, but still only 1.1 billion will live in

developed areas.

Poverty not only destroys democracy. What is

worse, it destroys societies and paves the way for

violence and, as we have often seen, even in our midst,

all forms of terrorism.

Finally, we consider it appropriate to repeat that

we are far from holding the answer necessary for the

world we have created.

We might not have spoken aloud these thoughts

that assuredly many of us have always had, had it not

been for the thousands of innocent women and men

that died on that ill-fated 11 September. We owe to

them — whom Americans will always remember with

love and grief, feelings we also share — our most

important responsibility: to see to it that they did not

die in vain.

Their tragic fate has shown us our duty. Now it is

time to do it.