El Salvador, 2008

First of all, I have the pleasure of congratulating you,

Sir, on being elected to preside over this session, an

honour falling to a Central American for the second

time in the history of the United Nations. I wish you

every success and commend you once again. I would

also like to express our gratitude for the work done by

Mr. Kerim as President of the previous session. On

behalf of El Salvador, I would also like to congratulate

the Secretary-General for the dynamism and

determination with which he is leading the

Organization.

It seems to me very timely that the central focus

of debate for this session is the impact of the global

food crisis on the issue of poverty and hunger

throughout the world, including the need to

democratize the United Nations. It is increasingly

evident every day that the world is facing a global

crisis that has a negative impact on development

efforts, especially in the poorest countries. Food,

climate, energy and financial problems are aggravating

the already difficult situation of developing countries.

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We are gathered here because we have a duty to

assume the political and moral responsibility to

respond to the problems currently facing the

international community. The world must learn from

both its successes and its failures. We must learn to

face crises collectively and turn them into

opportunities, for no one can solve them alone any

longer.

In order to preserve the progress made in the area

of development, we need to strengthen global

leadership to make it both decisive and accountable. In

the current crisis, there is a danger that we could lose

ground.

The economic and financial system cannot be at

the mercy of markets that operate on speculation.

Together, we must rebuild a wise capitalist system that

provides financing for economic development, rather

than one that rewards speculation.

We must help to prevent and mitigate serious

financial fluctuations. We must balance accounts and

stabilize credit. I agree with the President of the French

Republic that, in order to achieve this, countries

directly affected by the situation must meet as soon as

possible to find joint solutions to what is the most

acute financial crisis the world has experienced in 75

years.

It is undeniable the rise — and above all the

instability — in the price of oil continues to have a

negative impact on development efforts in most

countries in the world, in particular the smallest and

most vulnerable among them.

Here, I would like to reiterate the call I made

from this very rostrum last year (see A/62/PV.6), for

oil-producing countries to seek and implement flexible

mechanisms aimed at ensuring that hydrocarbon prices

do not continue to drastically affect developing

countries. Such mechanisms, of course, should not

ignore the harmful effects of speculation by

intermediaries in the world markets.

If we do not act jointly and immediately, and if,

in this forum, we are not able to come up with a

balanced solution to this problem, we will effectively

condemn oil-importing countries to bankruptcy for

years to come. We have invested in development, and

we have worked as hard as possible to achieve the

MDGs; those successes will be swept aside by the

excessive and crippling prices of oil. We cannot

continue to wait. We must take immediate political

decisions to shore up development and prevent a

deeper crisis in order to preserve global peace, security

and stability.

Faced with the food crisis, which is directly

affecting us all, we support the implementation of the

measures agreed upon during the June 2008 High-

Level Conference on World Food Security: the

Challenges of Climate Change and Bioenergy. We call

for action and assistance, particularly for affected

developing countries.

We would like to congratulate the Group of Eight

(G8) on its decision to support, in the framework of the

United Nations system, the establishment of a world

agriculture and food association, and the identification

of a range of actions to address the food crisis,

including through the participation of major

institutions.

In the face of this tangle of problems that require

creative responses, the countries of the Central

American Integration System (SICA) advocate the

initiative on action under the Staple Grains Plan, which

concentrates in particular on strengthening technical

assistance and public and private assistance and a

programme for financing, land leasing and a temporary

worker programme.

The countries of SICA and Brazil, during

El Salvador’s pro tempore presidency of that

organization, supported the holding of a special session

of the General Assembly on the world food and energy

crisis. As a result, a high-level meeting on food

security was held, beginning on 18 July, in this very

Hall, during which El Salvador explained the actions

that we have undertaken in order to deal with the crisis

in Central America, particularly in the most vulnerable

areas.

In our country, El Salvador, we are responding

with social programmes aimed at reducing extreme

poverty, fighting hunger and infant malnutrition, and

attaining other MDGs. At the next Ibero-American

summit of heads of State or Government, which will be

held in El Salvador, the subject of children under the

age of five will be a matter of priority.

In order to counter the impact of the economic

crisis on Salvadoranian households, we have created a

multidisciplinary commission with broad participation,

which has proposed a series of measures to address

23 08-51839

current effects and promote a social pact of national

solidarity for productivity and employment. Those

solutions involve business people, workers, political

parties and civil society bodies, and the creation of a

committee for the implementation of viable priority

actions.

One of the most successful measures that we have

implemented in El Salvador to prevent a food crisis is

the promotion of improved seed varieties for staple

grains, which has enabled us to achieve record

production this year.

However, I have to tell the Assembly that all the

efforts of solidarity we make as a global forum or as

individual countries require broad participation,

democratic stability, the enjoyment of full individual

liberties, and a genuine sense of social responsibility

on the part of Governments, irrespective of their

ideologies. International cooperation is also important

for strengthening national and regional efforts. That is

why El Salvador has insisted on the issue of

cooperation with middle-income countries.

In October 2007, at San Salvador, we held the

second International Conference on Development

Cooperation with Middle-Income Countries. In August

2008, in Namibia, my country co-chaired the third

Conference on that subject. At that meeting, we agreed

on measures including improving access to markets,

reducing poverty, fulfilling the MDGs, increasing the

competitiveness of our economies and improving our

physical and financial infrastructures.

The problems we face require decisive measures

to be taken. In that respect, I would ask all Member

States to support the fulfilment and implementation of

the commitments agreed upon in the El Salvador

Consensus and the Namibia Declaration, as well as the

consideration of this topic at the Global Conference on

Financing for Development in Doha. Those efforts

should lead to a General Assembly resolution with the

objective of reviewing current practices in the area of

international cooperation.

For middle-income countries, injustice is clearly

to be seen in international cooperation. The

commitment I propose should lead us to swiftly

prepare a multidisciplinary plan of action, global in its

scope, in order to strengthen development cooperation

for middle-income countries. We believe that new

types of development cooperation must also be

included, such as South-South cooperation, triangular

cooperation, the exchange of debt for investment in

social areas, such as health, education and the

environment, as we are already doing with Spain,

France and Germany. All of this could help us to attain

all of the MDGs and to meet other parameters

established by the United Nations.

In my view, it is important that as we seek

solutions to all of those problems, we never abandon

our ongoing efforts to achieve the MDGs. In that

respect, I am very happy to describe some of the

achievements we made during the period from 2001 to

2007.

Extreme poverty at the national level was reduced

from 32.6 per cent in 2001 to 12.8 per cent in 2007.

With regard to education, the net rate of school

enrolment increased from 78 to 93 per cent during that

same period. The percentage of schoolchildren who

enter the first grade of primary school and complete the

fifth grade has increased from 58 to 80 per cent, and

the literacy rate for young people between the ages of

15 and 24 has increased from 85 to 95 per cent. I

would also like to inform you that the Constitution of

El Salvador stipulates that primary education must be

free. With tremendous effort, our Government has

achieved and established free secondary education in

all El Salvador’s public education institutions.

With regard to environmental sustainability, the

percentage of the population without access to drinking

water dropped from 23.9 to 12.1 per cent and without

access to sanitation from 21.9 to 8.1 per cent.

In the fight against HIV/AIDS, I am very pleased

to report on the major efforts that we have undertaken

in El Salvador to help those suffering from

HIV/AIDS — first and foremost, universal free

antiretroviral drugs for all those who need them, with a

great number of decentralized hospitals providing that

treatment. In the last four years, we have managed to

reduce the mortality rate of those with HIV/AIDS by

35 per cent and the number of children born with

HIV/AIDS by 89.14 per cent, falling from 150 to

15 children annually.

With regard to implementing the goals of the

Special Session of the General Assembly on Children

in 2002, contained in the Plan of Action Creating a

World Fit for Children (A/S-27/19/Rev.1), I am pleased

to report the progress El Salvador has made. We have

achieved 15 of the 35 goals, particularly in the

reduction of extreme poverty, immunization, infant and

08-51839 24

maternal mortality and education of children and

adolescents.

Programmes such as the Solidarity Network,

which maps poverty in order to identify extreme

poverty, Alliance with the Family with 19 measures to

help the family purse, Solidarity Fund for Health and

healthy schools have been key to those successes. I

must underline that we have achieved some of the

targets established under the Millennium Development

Goals before the 2015 deadline, in particular

concerning poverty reduction, gender equality and

access to drinking water. That is why we support the

initiative of the Secretary-General to hold a summit in

2010 to review the progress made in implementing the

Goals.

With regard to existing regional asymmetries, and

even more those between developed and

underdeveloped countries, and the role the United

Nations should play regarding sustainable

development, the Member States need a modern, strong

global Organization with institutions able effectively to

face the new challenges of the current international

situation.

To that end, El Salvador would like to reiterate its

resolute support for the United Nations reform process,

so that the purposes and principles for which the

Organization was created in 1945 can be fulfilled,

particularly today when we are facing global threats

against peace, security, human rights and international

cooperation — fundamental pillars of development.

Security Council reform is particularly important

as part of that effort, and in that respect, we would like

to stress the need to bring changes to make that

institution more representative, democratic and

transparent, so as to adapt it to the current international

situation.

From this rostrum, I should like to reiterate once

again our profound appreciation to the United Nations

system for supporting the process of coordinating and

reinforcing the peace agreements in El Salvador.

Today, El Salvador is a model. We are living witnesses

of the fundamental role of the United Nations in

guaranteeing peace and stability.

Mindful of our experience, El Salvador is

participating actively as Vice-Chair of the

Peacebuilding Commission. Similarly, we have become

a troop-contributing country within the United Nations

system, a role that we are proud to assume to defend

world peace and security in times of need. On that

basis, we have participated and continue to take part in

operations in Côte d’Ivoire, Western Sahara, Liberia,

Iraq and Haiti, and recently, we joined the Spanish

contingent in the United Nations Interim Force in

Lebanon.

Migration, particularly when undocumented, has

increasingly become a source of differences, instability

and conflict. As a country of origin, transit and

destination for migratory flows, we appeal for the

continued strengthening of actions to combat and

prevent the illegal trafficking of migrants and trade in

persons in all their forms and for guaranteeing full

protection and support for the victims of those crimes,

particularly women and children.

While respecting the sovereign rights of States

with regard to their immigration policies, we call for a

comprehensive approach to international migration that

values the positive contributions made by immigrants

to the economy and culture of the communities where

they live, and favours schemes in support of controlled

migration, including temporary work programmes. I

should like to point out that, in the United States alone,

around 12 million undocumented migrants reside,

awaiting humane and comprehensive immigration

reform. They are good, hard-working people, who have

sacrificed their lives to support their families.

Another subject on which we must try to achieve

consensus is climate change and global warming. I

would like to stress that our country is meeting its

commitment to support international efforts to address

the effects of climate change.

In that regard, El Salvador is actively

participating in the international negotiations aimed at

creating an instrument that will complement the Kyoto

Protocol on the emission of greenhouse gases after

2012, and awaits the and successful conclusion of

those negotiations in 2009 at the conference in

Copenhagen, Denmark.

In the context of Central America, on 28 May

2008, the Presidents of the countries in the region

adopted, at the invitation of my colleague and friend

President Manuel José Zelaya Rosales of Honduras, the

Declaration of San Pedro Sula on climate change and

the environment, which set out guidelines for tackling

the serious problems arising from climate change. In

El Salvador, recently we launched the innovative

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project Green Network, which seeks to involve

Government and private institutions and the Ministries

of the Environment and of Education in the protection

of the environment through the implementation of

programmes to improve social and environmental

conditions for the most vulnerable.

That initiative has encouraged participation in

areas such as water security, judicious use of timber to

protect the forests, recycling in schools, energy saving

and responsible environmental business policies.

As the emissary of a nation that lives in

democracy and peace, respecting human rights and

fundamental freedoms, I should like to reiterate once

again, on behalf of El Salvador, our firm support for

the aspirations of the people of the Republic of China

in Taiwan to participate in the international

institutional structure, particularly in the United

Nations system. We support the initiative to examine

the participation of that country in the specialized

agencies of the United Nations, with particular

emphasis on the fact that the people of that country

cannot and should not remain isolated from the

international community and could contribute

experience, resources and knowledge to deal with the

challenges that we all face.

I also wish to refer to the case of Palestine.

Palestine should have its own State, as does Israel, with

secure borders. I think that the United Nations should

play a greater and more active role in ensuring that the

Palestinian people have their own territory and that the

territory of Israel is also respected through secure

borders.

This is the fifth time during my administration

that the Government of El Salvador has been

represented at the highest level in this important forum,

which is the universal and most democratic body in our

Organization. My presence in the General Assembly

and in other high-level meetings to discuss matters of

global interest constitutes an unequivocal

demonstration of the importance and relevance we all

attach to the work of the United Nations.

I would like to finalize my intervention as the

President of El Salvador in this forum. I hope that the

Organization will be strengthened on the basis of

understanding, solidarity and the political will of all of

its Members. I am absolutely convinced that if we

combine our wills, our abilities and our resources, we

will be able to steer the United Nations so that it may

effectively fulfil its role of promoting peace, security,

justice and sustainable development.

Despite the problems in the world, I am an

eternal optimist. Problems always have solutions, and

it is easier to find those solutions together. We must

promote tolerance and human dignity. There is no

greater bastion for peace and brotherhood than

understanding and respect for our diversity, our beliefs

and our fundamental values, if we are to live together

peacefully and with solidarity between nations.

I also wish to state today, within this global

forum, that the Central America of 20 years ago has

disappeared, that the world’s image of it is mistaken.

The Central American countries and the Central

American Integration System — SICA — are working

well. Integration is accelerating. Over the last three

years we have made more progress in Central

American integration than we have made over the last

fifty years.

Central America has taken valiant, bold

decisions, among them the customs union. Guatemala,

El Salvador and Honduras will be making progress in

the next few weeks in the area of customs — free

movement of people and goods in a Central America of

40 million people living in an atmosphere of peace and

tranquility, with the normal problems of any country,

but with many exchanges and closer contacts between

leaders.

Thanks to all, and may the supreme Creator guide

us towards those great goals. May God bless our

Organization, the whole world and Central America,

and may God bless the Earth to which El Salvador

belongs.