Bangladesh, 1995

I have the honour to

make the following statement on behalf of His Excellency

Mr. A. S. M. Mostafizur Rahman, the Foreign Minister of

Bangladesh, who, though present in New York, is unable

to attend this Assembly for reasons of health.

“I warmly congratulate Mr. Diogo Freitas do

Amaral on his unanimous election as President of

this historic fiftieth anniversary session of the United

Nations General Assembly. His election is a tribute,

not only to him personally, but to his great country,

Portugal. I am confident that he will do great honour

to the legacy of his predecessor, His Excellency Mr.

Amara Essy of Côte d’Ivoire, to whom we owe deep

appreciation, not least for his sponsorship of the

establishment, on 14 September, of the Open-ended

High-level Working Group on the strengthening of

the United Nations system.

“Let me also commend our Secretary-General,

Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, for his dedicated and

untiring efforts to promote the effectiveness of this

world body.

“In this fiftieth anniversary year, the United

Nations has reached a critical turning-point in

appraising its past and in charting a viable course for

its future, based on the renewed commitment, trust

and consensus of its Member States.

“The world of today is obviously quite different

from that of 1945. Then, the United Nations, in the

wake of the devastating global conflagration that

was the Second World War, was called upon

to save succeeding generations from the

scourge of war'.

In the wake of the cold war, the United Nations is

now called upon to consolidate and secure an

uncertain and amorphous peace.

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“The end of the cold war had fuelled hopes that

the United Nations, freed from nuclear and ideological

confrontation, would devote its full attention to

building a peaceful and more equitable world; tackle

the challenge of world poverty; advance regional

conflicts to resolution; distribute the benefits of peace

dividends; and move towards fulfilling the unrealized

premises of the Charter, especially with regard to

collective security.

“These hopes were belied. The world of the

1990s is more dangerous in many ways than the cold-

war era. There is greater tension in more places, a

further degradation in the quality of life and many

more complex issues of law and ethics, management

and practical cooperation. Negative impulses have

assumed a variety of dimensions within States,

between groups of States and globally.

“Within States, nations have come under siege

from multiple threats, retarding their capacity to act

effectively or independently. Political instability has

fuelled an economic breakdown, and economic

backwardness has created political upheaval in a

never-ending vicious circle. Long-suppressed national,

ethnic and cultural rivalries have resurfaced,

unleashing bigotry, extremism and violence. They

have generated powerful centrifugal forces that have

not only threatened to but actually breached

established boundaries. Demagogues, political

separatists and fringe groups are being encouraged and

supported by external forces to challenge the

legitimacy of Governments and their capacity to

govern.

“On another plane, fears are surfacing that the

bipolar world of the past 50 years could now assume

a North-South configuration, not between opposing

political and social systems, but between rich and poor

nations. Anxiety is increasing in the South that their

interests are being marginalized; that development

resources are being diverted or are dwindling; that

their potential to act as partners in revitalizing the

world economy is being ignored; and that new

constraints and conditionalities are being selectively

imposed.

“Globally, new forces are emerging that no State

acting alone can control but which threaten the

legitimacy of all States. Pollution, eco-damage,

devastating diseases, speculative dealers and money-

launderers, organized crime, arms smugglers and

terrorists have eaten into all societies, vitiated values

and crippled development. Rapid technological and

transnational processes are reducing the ability of

States to act on their own or to regulate domestic

policies affecting the movement of goods, services,

labour and capital. Tensions over resources are a

case in point. Forty per cent of the world’s

population live on the banks of rivers or lakes

shared by two or more countries. Dams and

irrigation projects cause serious tension and actual

conflict.

“Ironically, at a time when the United Nations

is in greater demand then ever before and its

capacity stretched to the limit, a serious campaign of

vilification has been launched against it. It has been

charged with mismanagement, inefficiency,

corruption, excessive costs and over-staffing. Its

growing membership, in the wake of decolonization,

has been termed irresponsible, obstructive and

divisive, and it has been accused of indiscriminately

exercising the so-called tyranny of the majority'.

This tarnished image, propagated by a few but

rejected by many, has left deep scars that have

diminished the United Nations.

“It is against this background that I now turn to

some of the priority concerns facing Bangladesh.

“First and foremost is the financial crisis that

threatens to undermine the United Nations. The

Secretary-General has declared that the United

Nations is already technically bankrupt. The

financial situation has to be placed on an adequate

and sustainable footing and its deterioration urgently

reversed.

“Bangladesh has consistently held that the

current financial difficulties were primarily a cash-

flow imbalance due mainly to the failure by some

Member States, in particular some major

contributors, to fulfil their Charter obligations in full

and on time. These Member States must give

practical effect to their commitment to the United

Nations by paying their assessed contribution in full

and on time, including all arrears. Capacity to pay

remains the fundamental tenet in determining

Member States’ contributions. To proceed on the

basis that simply a revision of the scales of

assessment would provide a panacea to all financial

ills is simplistic and misleading. It will neither

change the aggregate amount of revenues available

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to the United Nations nor guarantee better cash flows

or prompt payment. While it is likely that for some

time to come the bulk of United Nations revenues will

come from assessments and voluntary contributions,

Bangladesh supports exploring the possibility of

providing independent revenue sources for the United

Nations through various international transactions and

taxation.

“Bangladesh supports the reform efforts that have

been initiated to revitalize and restructure the main

organs of the United Nations and to achieve a more

dynamic interrelationship for them. We intend to

participate actively and constructively in the open-

ended, high-level Working Group on United Nations

reform which is to review the Secretary-General’s

Agendas for Peace and Development, respectively, and

the report submitted by Member States and

independent commissions. While we support the idea

that the broad objective of the reform is to strengthen

the response and efficiency of the United Nations

system in promoting the goals of development,

security, justice and equality and to improve

accountability and responsibility, we reject pursuit of

reforms of a purely mechanical or managerial nature.

It seems ironic that the yardstick for determining what

should or should not be pruned has been applied

selectively in the past, with peace-keeping operations

approved by the Security Council proliferating at the

cost of development programmes. Catchwords of cost-

effectiveness, financial stringency, trimming

management, redundancy, waste and inefficiency seem

intended more to constrain control and reduce the

United Nations role than improve its capability of

responding to the needs of the international

community.

“Our position with regard to Security Council

reform has concentrated more on strengthening the

transparency and efficiency of the Council’s mandate

than on enlargement of the permanent membership.

While we fully support enlargement of the overall size

of the Council to reflect the growth in membership of

the United Nations, we believe that an increase in

permanent members should be considered only on the

basis of the most stringent criteria, and on the basis of

global recognition and consensus. We are opposed in

principle to creating new centres of privilege or

distinctions that can distort the principle of sovereign

equality.

“Bangladesh welcomes the consensus achieved

in the outcomes of the major conferences in Cairo,

Copenhagen and Beijing on population, social

development and women, which supplement the

results of the Earth Summit, the children’s Summit

and the Vienna Conference on Human Rights.

Together they have forged a meaningful and

comprehensive social agenda that has reinforced

poverty eradication and people-centred sustainable

development. It must be emphasized, however, that

social development is dependent on economic

growth, which can be fuelled only in an international

economic environment which is conducive to it.

“The global society is only as strong as its

weakest link. The plight of the least developed

countries assumes special relevance and importance

in this 1995 mid-term review year of the least

developed countries’ Programme of Action for the

1990s. Their continuing crises calls for immediate

remedial action especially in increasing official

development assistance, writing off debts and

assuring greater trade access on preferential terms.

“Bangladesh has followed closely and supports

strongly the evolution and development of the

Secretary-General’s Agenda for Peace. We agree

with the priority emphasis that has been placed on

preventive diplomacy and conflict-prevention

measures and recognize especially their cost-

effectiveness. We believe that regional efforts and

regional agencies should be utilized more frequently

and their capacity strengthened. Bangladesh has

actively contributed to the peace-keeping mission of

the United Nations and has always favourably

responded in providing troops. We have closely

examined and positively responded to the request for

the provision of stand-by troops. We are also

favourably inclined to support a rapid-reaction

capability for providing humanitarian assistance.

“At plenary meetings the General Assembly

will have occasion to address in greater depth some

of the most pressing and critical political issues on

the agenda, including the ongoing conflict in Bosnia

and Herzegovina, in which prospects for a

negotiated solution have considerably brightened on

the basis of the Contact Group’s Peace Plan and the

Geneva Declaration of Principles of

8 September 1995; the continuing peace efforts in

the Middle East and the new interim agreement

between Israel and Palestinian leaders as a follow-up

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to the Oslo Agreement; the status of democracy and

human rights in Haiti; and the review of the work of

international tribunals established in former

Yugoslavia and in Rwanda. Given the fluidity and

rapid evolution of events in some of these crises, it is

our hope to comment on them at length during

consideration of the specific item.

“Let me say in conclusion that there is no doubt

in our mind that the United Nations remains the only

forum where we can meet the challenges of the future

by drawing upon our combined solidarity and

willingness to confront them together. Bangladesh

reaffirms its firm and unwavering commitment to this

world body and the pursuit of its great goals.”