Mali, 2000

At the

outset I should like to congratulate the President most

warmly on his election to preside over the General

Assembly at its fifty-fifth session. I take the

opportunity to assure him of my delegation's full

support as he carries out his difficult but uplifting task.

I feel sure that with his experience and abilities as an

able diplomat he will successfully guide our

discussions.

I should also like to extend my sincere and warm

congratulations to his predecessor, Mr. Theo-Ben

Gurirab, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Namibia, for

the ability and authority he demonstrated throughout

the fifty-fourth session.

I also take this opportunity of extending once

again to Secretary-General Kofi Annan our full

appreciation and support for his constant efforts and

resolve to find a better world in spite of the many

complex challenges in the new millennium. His

excellent report, “We the peoples: the role of the

United Nations in the twenty-first century”, is evidence

of this.

Mali welcomes Tuvalu to the Assembly. Its

admission to membership further strengthens the

universality of the Organization.

More than ever before, our world aspires to peace

and security and sustainable human development. In

this respect, our fifty-fifth session is unprecedentedly

important both historically and politically. The

exceptional opportunity offered us in the Millennium

Summit, which has renewed our hope in humankind,

must not be lost. The Millennium Declaration

demonstrates our maturity and our elevated sense of

responsibility for the future of humanity. Now we must

build this better world to which we all aspire. The

peoples of the United Nations look to us. They are

impatient. More than ever before they want to be actors

determining their own future, particularly people who

do not have very much, our people. They want to be

actors and to benefit from globalization.

That is how I see the historical and political

meaning of this session, which must give effect to the

dynamic now under way. Here, all together, we

reaffirm the place and the role of the United Nations in

the maintenance of international peace and security and

in cooperation for development, which require that the

United Nations become more legitimate by being more

democratic and stronger. What I say will be set against

this backdrop.

The maintenance of international peace and

security must remain our priority. The Organization is

increasingly faced with violent, deadly internal

conflicts that have taken the lives of millions of

civilians. It is therefore crucial to improve the system

of prevention and strengthen our institution's capacity

to organize and conduct operations effectively and

successfully. Here I pay tribute to the report of the

Panel on United Nations Peace Operations, led by

Lakhdar Brahimi. It is indeed a milestone in the

process of trying to make the United Nations “truly

credible as a force for peace” (A/55/305), so we must

quickly ensure that it has positive results. As the report

rightly emphasizes, United Nations intervention must

be decided upon on the basis of uniform criteria,

regardless of the region in which conflicts occur. The

multidisciplinary nature of new United Nations

peacekeeping missions demands clear and precise

mandates.

Mali welcomes efforts to strengthen cooperation

with regional organizations in regard to maintaining

peace, while respecting the competence of the Security

Council. Recent events in Sierra Leone remind us of

this and are a real challenge to us. Efforts by the

Organization of African Unity (OAU) and subregional

organizations must be supported to establish regional

capacity. This also applies to the Economic Community

of West African States (ECOWAS), which already has

a peacekeeping force and will soon have an early

warning system.

Peacekeeping operations cannot be a permanent

solution to conflicts or an answer to the underlying

causes. The international community must move from a

culture of reaction to a culture of prevention based on a

multidimensional approach, helping to save many

human lives and making additional resources available

for development. We must also emphasize that the

effectiveness of the United Nations in peacekeeping

depends largely on its capacity for prevention, crisis

management and peace-building. Here I appeal to the

international community to provide a stable and

healthy financial base for the Organization's

peacekeeping activities.

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I pay tribute to the second Security Council

summit held on 7 September, which dealt with the need

to give the Council an effective role in the maintenance

of international peace and security, particularly in

Africa. The resolution that emerged from that summit

deserves the support of us all, for it will certainly

strengthen our capacity for prevention and crisis

management.

We must also continue work to free the world

from the fear of weapons of mass destruction and face

up to the threat of light weapons.

With regard to nuclear non-proliferation, the

indefinite extension of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation

Treaty (NPT) regime, the entry into force of the

Chemical Weapons Convention, the signing and

ratification of many other treaties on important aspects

of disarmament, and the creation of nuclear-weapon-

free zones, are all important contributions to

confidence-building and nuclear disarmament.

Mali is fully committed to work to halt the plague

of the proliferation of light weapons. I appeal for

greater coordinated support for regional efforts,

including support for moratoriums, respect for

embargoes on arms deliveries and the strengthening of

controls. The United Nations conference in 2001 on

this issue must give the international community an

opportunity to take appropriate steps to end the

excessive destabilizing accumulation of such weapons.

The conference must look at all aspects and be fully

transparent.

I must mention here the troubling issue of

children affected by conflict, child soldiers, for the link

between the proliferation of light weapons and the

intolerable fate of these children is only too obvious.

We have a great responsibility for them, and we must

put an end to the destruction of so many hopes. The

International Conference on War-affected Children,

held in Winnipeg, which ended just a few days ago,

was an opportunity for us all to strengthen our

commitment to guarantee all children better health,

school for all, both boys and girls, free from war,

violence and famine.

At the beginning of the third millennium one of

the most urgent tasks facing humanity is to end the

growing inequality between rich and poor countries.

We must tackle the underlying causes of conflict —

primarily their economic and social dimensions. In an

international environment that is increasingly marked

by globalization, continuing poverty is our most

difficult challenge. The problem of the debt of the

developing countries must remain our focus, because it

is a major obstacle to their development. Complete

cancellation of the debt is needed in the overall

framework of finding a new development strategy.

This new development strategy involves direct

investment, unhampered access to markets through

special, differential treatment, fair prices for our goods,

and transfers of new technology, all of which are major

factors in development. This means that financing

development must remain on our agenda. My

delegation welcomes the convening in 2001 of a high-

level conference to deal with this issue at the

intergovernmental level. The challenges of

development cannot be taken up unless there is a stable

international financial system. My country advocates a

reform of the international financial system that takes

account of the social dimension of development and

does not jeopardize nations' capacity to pursue their

national development objectives.

Africa has understood full well that its role and

place in the emerging world implies a renewed political

approach of integration and unity of our continent.

That is the backdrop to the creation of the African

Union, which calls for a united Africa, strengthened by

an integrated development of its full potential and a

heightened awareness of its strategic advantages. Mali

was the first country to ratify the Constitutive Act of

the Union, which we are convinced is the springboard

for the development of the continent, and for a

responsible Africa, an Africa that counts.

We must work together to eradicate poverty. We

have a responsibility to guarantee all human beings a

life of decency and dignity, with equal opportunities

for all peoples. We can do this. It requires enhanced

cooperation and international solidarity through a

multilateral approach guided by the United Nations.

We must promote global social development, for

we believe that excessive unshared wealth is a poor

kind of wealth, a wealth with no social value and

therefore contrary to the essence of our life.

The values that give meaning to the wealth of the

world are those of democracy. Here I refer to the strong

words of President Konaré, who rightly told the

community of democracies conference, held in

Warsaw, that the development of democracy is the

basis for a world of peace, solidarity and social justice,

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and that only democracy can allow each of us to

shoulder the burden, but also the honour, of being a

human being and serving humankind. “What an honour

it is to be a human being!” he said.

The Ministerial Conference on Security, Stability,

Development and Cooperation in Africa said rightly

that democracy, good governance, respect for human

rights, the rights of peoples, and the rule of law, are

prerequisites to achieving security, stability and

development in Africa. Nothing must prevent open

discussion of ideas and the promotion of political

pluralism. Despite inadequacies, difficulties and

sometimes violent breakdowns, the democratic process

is gaining ground in Africa. A democratic Africa is

becoming increasingly real, but it is still a fragile

reality that must be supported and helped. Mali

welcomes the adoption last June by the [Community of

Democracies] of the Warsaw Declaration, advocating

the strengthening of cooperation among democratic

countries with a view to sharing the best practices,

protecting themselves against threats to democratic

processes, and promoting the emergence of a

partnership forum to help democracies in transition.

We must be strong against unconstitutional

change of political regimes so that we can strengthen

democracy. We must condemn such changes as a matter

of principle and there must be consequences. President

Konaré said that pressure must be credible and can

only attain its goal if the international community

adopts a firm consistent and constructive approach in

the event of any putsch or attempted coup d'état. It

must avoid encouraging those who are tempted to

violate republican and democratic rules by removing

any ambiguity. In this respect, the international

community must be clearer and more rigorous in its

approach and support the OAU which seeks to deter

putsches by taking a clear position and by imposing

political sanctions. Could this position not also be

taken up in the United Nations?

Along the same lines the establishment of the

International Criminal Court with the Rome Statues

would be a permanent body to act against impunity. It

would allow us to try those responsible for the most

horrible crimes and it would also be a tool for

deterrence that could contribute to the maintenance of

international peace and security. Mali has already

ratified the Court's Statute, thus showing that it

supports the struggle against the culture of impunity

and to ensure respect for human dignity.

In view of the progress in achieving some

settlement in the Lockerbie matter, we would call for

the definitive and immediate lifting of sanctions that

are unjustly inflicting suffering on the brother people

of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. We must be careful

about sanctions because of the humanitarian cost

involved. We must use more effective, targeted

sanctions.

On the Korean peninsula we welcome the recent

inter-Korean summit and the exchange visits by

peoples of both countries. We welcome and support

these initiatives which begin a direct dialogue between

the parties involved and promote peace and stability in

the Korean peninsula.

HIV/AIDS jeopardizes the future of millions of

men, women and children in Africa and it is also a

threat to international peace and security. A failure to

deal with this would be culpable and suicidal

indifference. In this connection we fully support the

proposal to convene a special session of the General

Assembly on AIDS.

Adapting the United Nations to the requirements

of the age is absolutely essential. The challenges facing

us in the political, economic and social areas force us

to demonstrate creativity and realism so that we can

come up with innovative and constructive suggestions

and translate them into action in the true interests of

our peoples. My delegation believes in the need to

democratize the United Nations further, to restructure

all its principal organs. Reform of the Security Council

will give effect to our desire to modernize this

important organ that the Charter makes primarily

responsible for threats to and breaches of international

peace and security. A reformed Council must be more

transparent in its working methods, more democratic,

more representative, more legitimate in its

membership, and it must be more credible in the way it

is perceived by other member States. Mali reaffirms

Africa's demand for equitable distribution of seats in

the two categories, pursuant to the Harare Declaration

adopted by the OAU Summit of Heads of State or

Government.

More than ever before the human being must be

the very heart of the new millennium. The peoples

expect the United Nations to promote and ensure a

world of progress for all, a world of peace, a world of

sharing. In this respect Mali sees the Millennium

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Declaration as the fabric we can use to build a better

world. Now is the time for action.