Bangladesh, 1997

It affords me great

pleasure and honour to convey to you, Mr. President, on

behalf of my delegation, as well as on my own behalf, our

heartiest congratulations on your unanimous election. It is

a fitting tribute not only to your outstanding diplomatic

skills and long involvement with the United Nations, but

also to your country, with which we enjoy friendly

relations.

To your predecessor, Ambassador Razali Ismail of

Malaysia, I should like to express our sincere appreciation

for the remarkable job that he did. His was an

extraordinarily proactive presidency. Indeed, he has given

new stature to the office of President of the General

Assembly.

This is the first regular session of the General

Assembly for our Secretary-General Kofi Annan since his

appointment to that high office. In the discharge of his very

onerous responsibilities he brings to bear unmatched

expertise with regard to the United Nations system. Indeed,

he is the archetypical insider of that system. His

appointment to the highest Secretariat position is

recognition of his manifest competence. The priority that he

has attached to the task of making the United Nations

system more streamlined and attuned to present-day

realities and requirements is indeed commendable.

While on the subject of reform, let me say that my

delegation lends its full support to the initiative of the

Secretary-General in submitting his reform proposal, which

the Assembly will be examining later in the course of its

business. There is no denying that the proposal is timely

and that it has been put forward to make the United

Nations more efficient and effective. We expect that the

reform process will preserve and promote the centrality

and sanctity of the principles and objectives of the United

Nations Charter. My delegation also wants the process of

reform to be carried out with the primary objective of

strengthening the capacity of the Organization to address

issues of development. Bangladesh would favour

negotiating the reform package in informal plenary

meetings with the full participation of all countries.

The United Nations Charter is of enduring validity.

By definition, reform has to be a dynamic and periodic

process as times, problems and priorities change. My

delegation would fully support any endeavour to improve

the administration and management of the United Nations.

Member States have the right and even the duty to insist

that optimal use be made of the resources that they have

entrusted to the Organization for the promotion of the

Charter objectives. Bangladesh assures its unstinted

cooperation and support to eliminate duplication and

overlap and to effect better coordination and prioritization.

However, reform cannot be an acceptable surrogate for

political will, and those two aspects must be mutually

supportive and reinforcing.

In the context of the reform exercise, Bangladesh

would like to stress that the exclusively international

character of the responsibilities of the Secretary-General

and his staff should in no way be compromised.

According to Article 101 of the Charter, the highest

standards of efficiency, competence and integrity should

be the basic determinants in making appointments to the

Secretariat, with due regard to geographical distribution.

We therefore welcome the Secretary General’s proposal

to submit a code of conduct for international civil

servants.

No endeavour at United Nations reform will be

successful without the necessary financial resources. The

continuation of the current financial crisis of the United

Nations has seriously impaired the functioning of the

Organization. For a financially sick United Nations, the

much needed shot in the arm can come only from the full

and unconditional payment of outstanding contributions

by those Member States that have not yet done so.

The cold-war era of adversarial alliances, power

blocs and ideological divides is happily a thing of the

past. However, another war, one in which the United

4

Nations will have to be in the vanguard, remains to be

fought and won before a meaningful peace and international

security can be achieved. That is the war against poverty,

ignorance and prejudice.

Peace does not simply happen or come about

fortuitously. It must be sedulously built and nurtured and

underpinned by a host of interrelated actions that are

inextricably linked to development and human security. A

culture of peace is essential to make it sustainable and all

embracing. Over the years, the concept of security has

evolved, as has the concept of development. The United

Nations can be, as the President of the General Assembly

put it last year, the main development catalyst, one that can

strongly influence coordination at the macro level with

other bodies that have more access to resources but that are

less democratically set up.

We have been discussing for the past few years the

question of Security Council expansion and reform. There

is a clear logic and rationale for an expansion of the overall

size of the Council to make it more representative in

character. On this aspect of the question a general

consensus seems to have emerged, although there exist

differences as to the exact size of any new Council. Where

a convergence of view — let alone consensus — continues

to elude us is on the question of the expansion of the

number of permanent seats. Bangladesh’s concern, which

we have already articulated, is that, in any enlargement

exercise, the concerns of the smaller and more vulnerable

States that have the most vital stake in an effective and

dynamic United Nations should not be lost sight of.

In the decade of the 1990s we have had a series of

high-profile global conferences. These mega-conferences

have addressed some of the major challenges that are

confronting us today and, with the United Nations playing

a central role, reached important political consensus. Those

gatherings underscored in particular the primacy of human

development in achieving sustained and sustainable

development.

The Agenda for Development adopted in June this

year is in a sense the culmination of this series,

representing a synthesis of the plans and programmes of

action that had been adopted. The Agenda is the result of

tortuous and painstaking negotiations carried out over a

period of four years. It is a matter of gratification to have

achieved a development consensus that was so badly

needed and clearly warranted. It is, of course, most vital

that, along with the Agenda for Development, follow-up

and implementation should match the outcome of these

conferences.

Bangladesh believes that without the full

involvement of civil society this process will remain

incomplete. Recognizing the key role of civil society in

promoting global partnership, we welcome the Secretary-

General’s proposal for a people’s millennium Assembly

in the year 2000.

It is now widely accepted that free enterprise, the

market economy, international trade and competition, as

well as broad-based public participation in economic

expansion, are the keys to economic growth and human

development. To this mix must be added the components

of democracy, good governance and the rule of law. This,

however, in no way diminishes, particularly in the case of

the least developed countries, the imperative of a

supportive external environment. Improved access to

world markets, greater inflow of foreign private

investment, transfer of technology and managerial know-

how and larger external assistance all have very important

roles to play in ensuring development. Economic

liberalization should invariably be combined, in our view,

with adequate social safety nets to safeguard the most

vulnerable segments of society.

It is a matter of some concern to us that global

official development assistance flows continue to slump.

We sincerely hope, though, that this trend will be

reversed. The development of the South is not only an

investment in peace and security, but would clearly also

rebound to the advantage of the countries of the North in

the long and not so long run, since this would mean

bigger markets for their exports, with all their

concomitant benefits. Development has been most aptly

described as a partnership.

The plight of the least developed countries, in

particular, calls for very careful consideration and has in

the past merited a special place and focus in the

international agenda. Two major international conferences

on the least developed countries have been held in the

1980s and 1990s and important decisions and programmes

of action adopted. The implementation of these, however,

has been disappointing. We hope that the third United

Nations Conference on the least developed countries can

be held in the year 2000 to chart the course of global

support for these weakest members at the start of next

millennium.

5

We would urge special consideration and concessions

for the least developed countries in order to enable them to

meet World Trade Organization deadlines. Indeed, if the

situation so warrants, deadlines may even be made flexible

for that group of countries. We would also urge that, at the

forthcoming high-level meeting in Geneva next month, all

major issues of concern to the least developed countries,

including duty-free access of their products to foreign

markets, be given most favourable consideration.

The end of cold war perhaps naturally raised our

hopes for a new and exciting world order in which nations

would share the responsibility for freedom and justice and

the strong would respect the rights of the weak — a world

of open borders, open trade and open minds. Such a vision

can and should surely be our goal and inspiration. To

achieve it, in particular at the regional level, cooperation in

carefully identified core areas of activity, including trade

and investment, is a valuable tool of development.

In our own region, through the South Asian

Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), we are

striving to accelerate progress in core areas of cooperation,

such as poverty eradication, expansion of regional trade and

investment. We have also, within the ambit of SAARC,

launched a “growth quadrangle” involving four member

States — Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Bhutan — in order

to explore areas of joint economic activity and take

advantage of the factor of contiguity. Moreover, outside of

SAARC, Bangladesh has entered the Bangladesh-India-Sri

Lanka-Thailand Economic Cooperation (BIST-EC) in order

to boost cooperation in the economic and commercial fields

among its four member countries. A consensus decision has

now been taken to allow Myanmar to join this subregional

group as a full member.

Last year, while addressing the General Assembly, I

referred to the negotiations that were being held with India

on sharing the waters of the Ganges River. This had proved

to be an intractable problem for over two decades and it is

a matter of great satisfaction to us all that, in December last

year, we signed a 30-year treaty at the highest political

level with India on sharing arrangements. The signing of

this treaty, within months of the present Government’s

assumption of office, demonstrated that, given goodwill and

political will, the most difficult problems can be resolved.

At the national level, we are affording every facility

and cooperation to our private sector and providing liberal

incentives to foreign entrepreneurs to invest in our country.

The Government’s role will be to oversee and to provide

safety nets where necessary. The Government is making

every effort to combat the blighting scourges of

widespread poverty and deprivation, so that we may

realize the dream — to which the Father of the Nation,

Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, dedicated his

entire political career and life — of a country free,

progressive and prosperous, at peace with the world and

with itself.

Ours has also been a pioneering role in the field of

microcredit. Initiated by the Grameen Bank and

considered a most innovative approach to the eradication

of poverty and empowerment of women, it has been

recognized and emulated in a good number of developing

and developed countries. The Microcredit Summit held in

Washington earlier this year was a success: a target was

set there to free 100 million families from the

stranglehold of poverty by the year 2005. At the United

Nations, the “Friends of Microcredit” ambassadors have

taken the initiative to follow up the implementation

process throughout the United Nations system.

In Bangladesh, we have accorded priority to and

placed special emphasis on social sector development in

such areas as health care, education, family planning,

women in development and the preservation and

promotion of human rights. The initiatives and efforts of

our Prime Minister in this regard have been widely

appreciated. I would particularly mention here that the

Government, under the dynamic leadership of Prime

Minister Sheikh Hasina, the illustrious daughter of the

Father of the Nation, has announced the decision to set up

a National Human Rights Commission. Our Parliament is

expected to pass the required legislative mandate for this

Commission next year. We are also working towards the

establishment of grameen, or rural, courts, which will

take justice to the people at the grass-roots level. This

concept of participatory justice is still a novel one. Its

purpose is to ensure speedy, effective and inexpensive

justice to the humblest of citizens.

While on the subject of human rights, I should like

to express our pleasure that an individual of the eminence

and distinction of Mrs. Mary Robinson has been

appointed United Nations High Commissioner for Human

Rights. We would like to assure her of the wholehearted

cooperation of our Government. We look forward to

working with her in close concert in the promotion of

human rights, a goal that all of us share and cherish, with

special focus on the right to development and the rights

of women and children.

6

The Constitution of Bangladesh specifically provides

for our international relations to be based, inter alia, on the

principles of the United Nations Charter. It is thus for us a

matter of singular pride and gratification that Bangladesh

should be playing such an active role in United Nations

peacekeeping operations. This is a role that we consider to

be a solemn duty and an earnest of our commitment to the

United Nations and the principles and purposes of the

Charter.

We still have a long way to go in the area of

disarmament, particularly nuclear disarmament. The entry

into force of the Chemical Weapons Convention is a major

step forward.

It is a truism that our world is becoming increasingly

interdependent. The uncomfortable fact remains, though,

that it is still a far more dangerous place than that it should

be. West Asia, the Palestinian issue, Bosnia and

Herzegovina, Afghanistan and the Great Lakes region all

present problems that impinge on international peace and

security. The United Nations, of course, is playing a pivotal

role in seeking peaceful and equitable resolutions of these

problems.

We sincerely hope that the peace process in the

Middle East will move forward and that the years of

negotiations, investment and effort will bear fruit. Our

views on this particular issue are well known. Relevant

Security Council resolutions exist, as do agreements

negotiated outside the ambit of the United Nations, on the

basis of which a meaningful peace can be achieved in the

Middle East and the legitimate rights of the Palestinian

people, including the right to an independent homeland,

restored.

As we approach the next century, it will have to be

our collective endeavour to strengthen and to reinforce

institutions at the global level that can effectively address

the problems of the post-cold-war world. The United

Nations in essence represents the entire human race in

microcosm, with its wisdom and follies, its successes and

shortcomings. It is an experiment, as was once said, in

living together as a single human family. To be sure, the

United Nations is an Organization of Governments — the

apex of intergovernmental organs. And yet it is also true

that its foundations rest on the yearnings of the peoples of

the world for a lasting peace.

The opening words of the Charter read:

“We the peoples of the United Nations determined

to save succeeding generations from the scourge of

war”.

The peoples and nations of the world will have to work

in concert if stability, prosperity and a meaningful peace

are to be achieved on a global scale. Bangladesh, of

course, will be at the forefront of this endeavour.