Zambia, 1997

I am pleased to

convey the congratulations of the Zambian delegation to

His Excellency Mr. Hennadiy Udovenko on his election

as President of the fifty-second session of the United

Nations General Assembly. This session is especially

important in that it is meant to give impetus to the

ongoing negotiations on the future structure of the United

Nations through the reform process. We are confident that

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with his proven diplomatic skills he will steer the

deliberations of this session to a successful conclusion.

For his predecessor, Ambassador Razali Ismail of

Malaysia, my delegation has only words of admiration and

gratitude for the exemplary work he did during the past

session of the General Assembly.

I wish to express my delegation’s satisfaction with the

skilful manner in which the Secretary-General, Mr. Kofi

Annan, has managed the affairs of the Organization since

his election last year. Zambia is confident that, given his

tested managerial and diplomatic skills, he will effectively

manage this Organization as it deals with critical issues

confronting the international community today.

At the fiftieth session, world leaders gathered here to

celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the

United Nations. In celebrating the occasion, we took time

to assess the contribution of the United Nations to world

peace, economic and social development, and the

observance of fundamental human rights, and we reaffirmed

our faith in the Organization and agreed to vigorously live

up to the objectives of the Charter by strengthening and

revitalizing the United Nations system.

It is against this background that my delegation

believes that the current session of the General Assembly

should seize the opportunity to advance the reform process

further. In this regard, it is Zambia’s conviction that a

comprehensive approach to United Nations reform would,

apart from improving efficiency and effectiveness, ensure

the implementation of the programmes of action of the

global conferences of the 1990s — from Rio to Cairo;

Copenhagen to Beijing and Istanbul — which underscored

the importance of sustainable development and made it a

central theme and a priority. These conferences provided a

starting point for a global effort in advancing sustainable

development, set goals and defined broad plans of action

that provided the basis on which national and international

actions could proceed.

While we have agreed on the necessity of reforming

our Organization, it is important to ask ourselves what we

want to achieve through these reforms. In principle, Zambia

welcomes and has carefully studied the Secretary-General’s

proposals and measures on the negotiations for reform of

the United Nations. My delegation expects that the reform

process would not only result in a more democratic,

efficient, effective and financially stable United Nations, but

also have a significant impact on economic and social

development. Zambia would like to see the development

mandate of the United Nations given priority and

prominence in these reforms.

Related to this reform process is the pressing issue

of the critical financial situation of the United Nations. It

is our view that this state of affairs is the major limiting

factor undermining the ability of the United Nations to

deal adequately with its mandates in many areas. We

would therefore like to see arrears owed to the

Organization paid in full, on time and without

preconditions.

One of the key components of the reforms of the

United Nations is the reform of the Security Council. We

demand that the expansion of the Security Council make

it more representative and more democratic. This

expansion should be at both permanent and non-

permanent levels of membership. In this regard, my

delegation wishes to state categorically its support for the

position adopted by the Organization of African Unity

(OAU) and the Non-Aligned Movement that the expanded

Security Council should have 26 members.

Zambia further supports the demand that the regions

of Africa, Asia, and Latin America and the Caribbean

now deserve seats as permanent members on an expanded

Security Council. Africa, commanding nearly 30 per cent

of the membership of the United Nations, certainly

deserves to have two permanent and three non-permanent

seats on the Security Council.

My delegation reaffirms its commitment to general

and complete disarmament. In this spirit, we would also

like to welcome the recent agreement reached in Oslo.

Norway, to ban anti-personnel landmines. We hope that

all countries of the world will be able to sign the

agreement in December this year in Ottawa.

International peace and security also continues to be

threatened by conflicts around the globe. Africa, in

particular, has witnessed many civil wars whose

consequences have been devastating.

Zambia continues to be concerned about the conflicts

in the Great Lakes region of Central Africa, the Republic

of Congo, Sudan and elsewhere on the continent. We

would like to appeal to the parties to these conflicts to

commit themselves to the principle of negotiated and

peaceful settlement of disputes. We call upon the

international community to provide all necessary

assistance for resolving these conflicts at an early stage.

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In Angola, the civil war has caused some of the worst

human suffering. As host to the talks that led to the signing

of the Lusaka Protocol, Zambia has a firm desire to ensure

that there is lasting peace and security in Angola. However,

Zambia is disappointed at the failure of the União Nacional

para a Independência Total de Angola (UNITA) to comply

with its obligations under the Lusaka Protocol and the

provisions of relevant Security Council resolutions. Zambia

would like to record its displeasure at UNITA’s

intransigence.

Zambia, together with the Southern African

Development Community (SADC) and other countries, will

continue its efforts to promote conditions leading to the

establishment of lasting peace and security in Angola. We

believe that peace in Angola will enlarge the parameters of

peace in southern Africa, which will enable the countries of

the region to concentrate their efforts on social and

economic development in an environment of democracy.

Zambia reaffirms the position of the OAU with regard

to the situation in Sierra Leone. In this regard, we appeal

to the international community to continue to deny

recognition to the military junta in Sierra Leone. We

demand that the junta hand power back to the

democratically elected Government of Sierra Leone.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo has just

emerged from a seven-month civil war. We are delighted

that the country has now begun to turn its attention to the

challenges of reconstruction and development. We thus

appeal to the international community to unconditionally

assist the new administration in that country in facilitating

rehabilitation of infrastructure and capacity-building to

consolidate the political and economic stability of the

country.

We congratulate the people of Liberia on finding

peace through the democratic process and also take this

opportunity to pay tribute to the Economic Community of

West African States Monitoring Group (ECOMOG) for the

commendable role it has played in resolving the Liberian

conflict.

Regarding peacekeeping in Africa, we believe that

Africa has the primary responsibility for resolving the

conflicts on our continent. It is precisely for this reason that

the Organization of African Unity established the

Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and

Resolution, which we hope the international community

will fully support.

On the economic front, Zambia is gratified to note

that sub-Saharan Africa has begun to record positive

growth rates, which averaged 5 per cent in 1996, the

highest level in 20 years. Much of this success is

attributable to the social and economic reforms

undertaken by many African countries. However, this

positive achievement can be sustained only if poverty,

deprivation and marginalization are effectively addressed.

Another factor that continues to constrain efforts for

sustainable development in many African countries,

including my own, is the heavy external debt burden.

Zambia welcomes the steps taken by the International

Monetary Fund and the World Bank to implement the

Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Debt Initiative. We are,

however, gravely concerned about the uncertainties

surrounding the funding for the Initiative. We also remain

concerned about the proliferation of conditions, in

particular the use of non-economic factors in determining

access to the Initiative.

Zambia believes that the United Nations has a duty

to provide leadership in forging international consensus

on the crippling external debt problem of developing

countries and assisting in the mobilization of new

resources for development financing. It is also our

expectation that the United Nations will provide

leadership in redressing the widening development

disparities existing among nations, and addressing the

increasing trends towards unfair trading practices and

protectionism in international trade, which have had the

effect of marginalizing some regions, notably Africa.

Zambia is very concerned about the continued

decline in official development assistance at a time when

the United Nations is dealing with follow-up to recent

international conferences on development. There is also

increasing evidence of lack of enthusiasm for honouring

agreements freely entered into at international

conferences. A case in point is the failure by

Governments to implement the agreements, commitments

and recommendations made at the 1992 United Nations

Conference on Environment and Development.

The special session of the General Assembly held

this past June to review progress in implementation of the

Rio agreements found that the rate of implementation of

the programme of action has been extremely slow, mainly

due to lack of resources. It was also evident that there

was a marked lack of political will to ensure the

fulfilment of the agreements of the Rio consensus on

environment and development. Zambia would therefore

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like to see, during this session of the General Assembly,

progress on the proposal to convene an international

conference on the financing of development. As we all are

aware, there has been little progress on this proposal since

the forty-sixth session of the General Assembly, when it

emerged.

On the domestic front, we in Zambia have adopted

national programmes of action in pursuit of the goals and

objectives of the Copenhagen World Summit on Social

Development, the Cairo Conference on Population and

Development and the Beijing Declaration. In implementing

these programmes of action, my Government has targeted

the most vulnerable members of our society to enhance the

capacity of their involvement in the country’s economic and

social life, with a view to raising their standards of living.

In this regard, the Government has taken steps to ensure

that there is equitable access to quality education by all

Zambians by providing universal basic education within the

shortest realistic time-frame. A comprehensive programme

of health reforms is also under way, and this should also

result in the improvement of the health status of our people.

The measures and programmes that the Government has

undertaken are not, however, sufficient to fully attain the

objectives of these programmes of action, mainly due to

limited financial resources.

We wish to conclude by underscoring the continuing

relevance of the United Nations. The case for reform has

been made. We owe it to ourselves and to future

generations to ensure that we apply ourselves to the task of

reform, knowing well that the world needs a United Nations

that can be relied upon to act effectively in ensuring peace

and security, and in achieving international cooperation in

the economic, social, cultural and humanitarian fields, as

envisaged in the Charter of the United Nations.