Nauru, 2008

I offer my congratulations to

Mr. Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann on his election to the

presidency of the General Assembly at its sixty-third

session. I can assure him that Nauru will lend its full

cooperation to him as he leads our work during this

time. Also, allow me to take this opportunity to

commend his predecessor, His Excellency Mr. Srgjan

Kerim, for his leadership of the General Assembly at

its sixty-second session.

I wish to reaffirm Nauru’s commitment and

abiding faith in the ideals and objectives of the United

Nations. We declare our support for the Organization’s

efforts to resolve the multiple humanitarian, peace and

security and development challenges confronting our

world today.

I am grateful for this opportunity to address the

Assembly for the first time as President of the Republic

of Nauru. I took the challenge of the office fully

cognizant of my responsibilities to the people of

Nauru. Despite knowing that the road to our economic

recovery will be slow and painful, I have committed

my Administration to carrying out its duties based on

the fundamental principles of democracy, good

governance and sound socio-economic policies.

At the beginning of this decade, Nauru was at the

brink of total economic collapse. Much has been

achieved to improve our economy and to address the

resulting social problems. That has been accomplished

by implementing a range of fiscal, economic and

governance reforms. I am happy to say that Nauru

today has stabilized. We are now at the beginning of a

rebuilding phase in our history. However, I say this

with a degree of caution and regard for the fragility of

our situation.

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In order to secure Nauru’s recovery and to ensure

rebuilding and development, we will need ongoing

assistance from our development partners. We need

coordinated assistance targeted at our priorities and in

line with our strategies so that we may fulfil our

promise for a better quality of life for my people.

Nauru appreciates the financial and material

assistance from our development partners, in particular

Australia, Taiwan, Japan, New Zealand and the

European Union. We appeal for such cooperation to be

continued in order to strengthen our nation-building

efforts.

Since assuming office, I have been determined

that Nauru learn from, and not repeat, the mistakes of

the past. As a consequence of mismanagement and

corruption, past Administrations took Nauru from what

then seemed to be a bright future to standing on the

brink of collapse. In that process, national reserves and

assets were all lost, and we have been left with an

unmanageable burden of domestic and external debt.

Nauru will only ever be able to service a very small

portion of that debt if we are to ensure ongoing

recovery and sustained development. We therefore seek

the understanding and consideration of those countries

and institutions to which we owe money and appeal to

them to allow debt forgiveness or major write-downs.

At the same time, we are implementing financial,

legislative and constitutional measures to ensure that

this never happens again.

Our limited human resources capacity, relative to

the enormity of the tasks yet to be accomplished, is a

further impediment to our development goals.

Improving the quality of education in our schools,

promoting trade and skills training, certifying existing

skills and encouraging ongoing professional and job-

related development are therefore high priorities for

my Government. Increasing our human resources

capacity will not only serve to address the risk to

sustaining our development, but will increase job

opportunities for my people, domestically and abroad.

With unemployment overall estimated above 30 per

cent, and worse among our youth, labour migration and

the associated remittances must be seen as part of the

range of measures to secure Nauru’s recovery and

future.

I appeal to all developed countries with major

workforce requirements to open up their job

opportunities, reduce barriers to trade in services and

promote labour mobility. That can contribute far more

to the development of small States than many other

traditional forms of aid. Moreover, such measures can

be targeted at specific sectors and activities, for fixed

time periods and with certain conditions. The New

Zealand and Australian unskilled labour schemes for

Pacific workers are two prime examples. The United

States military expansion in Guam provides another

opportunity for significant development assistance to

the Pacific. We call on the United States for

preferential access to those opportunities. That will

require special trade, labour and immigration

conditions.

We need to build our human resources capacity to

shift Nauru away from its historical reliance on

government and public sector employment. Likewise,

we must develop the private sector in Nauru. We

encourage foreign direct investment, and we welcome

assistance in developing diversity and new industries in

Nauru. My Government is focused on creating the

environment to encourage and facilitate the growth of

our private sector.

Nauru’s recovery and future development are

particularly vulnerable to external factors. Pacific

island developing States are greatly exposed to both

the food and the energy security crises. Dependence on

imported foods, our remoteness and rising fuel and

transport costs have made both food and energy

security particularly critical issues for our region.

That is especially true for Nauru. Consider our

situation: our island home is fringed by a narrow rim,

where my people live just a couple of metres above sea

level. The mining of phosphate on Nauru has left large

pinnacle rocks covering 80 per cent of the island,

which prevents agriculture and contributes to

desertification and drought.

Although we place a high priority on the

production of nutritious traditional staples, arable land

is just too scarce to achieve a sustainable level of food

security. The Secretary-General stated in his address

yesterday (see ) that at this time last year rice

cost $330 a ton and that today it is now $730. Nauru is

paying nearly double that. Our imported rice costs us

$1,340 a ton. Rice and other staples are simply

becoming unaffordable. Without urgent attention to our

region, it is estimated that an additional 5 per cent of

our people will slip into poverty because of high food

prices.

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We need the world to increase food production.

That requires investment in training and in

implementing appropriate farming techniques, together

with efficient seed and fertilizer distribution. We also

need increased access to food. That includes reviewing

trade policies on food aid.

The energy crisis is anther significant external

factor that has an impact on our recovery and the

security of our future. Nauru already cannot afford the

cost of the fuel required to provide for all its energy

needs. As a consequence, my people suffer, with

scheduled power cuts of up to eight or more hours

every single day. That has an impact on parents’ ability

to care for and feed their children. Without power,

houses have no running water, adding to health and

sanitation problems. Power shedding limits business

development and impedes government services and

productivity.

The energy crisis is further disproportionately

impacting Nauru in terms of transport services. Sea,

land and air, passenger and freight: all are fast

becoming unaffordable for my people, further isolating

our island nation and hindering our sustainable

development. We need urgent assistance, both to

develop immediate alternative sources of energy and to

access economically viable sources of fuel.

The current reliance on fossil fuels for energy has

further particular significance for the Pacific small

island developing States. It has resulted in emissions

that are causing sea-level rise and climate change. This

is not scientific theory: we are experiencing the effects

right now.

As with the food crisis, Nauru and the Pacific are

not contributors to the causes, but we are particularly

vulnerable. We will pay the highest costs and are the

first countries to feel the direct consequences. Global

warming is predicted conservatively to raise sea levels

by one metre in this century. That will flood our only

habitable land. Our people will be literally trapped

between the rising sea and an ancient, uninhabitable

coral field.

Despite our many challenges, we are working

hard to create a safe and sustainable haven from the

rising sea. We must rehabilitate our mined phosphate

lands and return them to a habitable, arable state. The

cost of rehabilitating 80 per cent of our island is well

beyond our immediate means. Rehabilitation of the

island is a high priority, and, as part of climate change

adaptation, we call for sufficient funding mechanisms,

including support from the United Nations and

financial and private sector institutions, to help restore

our nation and improve our resilience.

To address climate change as a world society, we

need to meet much of our energy needs through

renewable energy sources, and by reducing emissions

from fuels and using cleaner fuels. But as critical as

that is for my nation, it is clear to me that the emitting

countries have yet to do all they can. We all share the

same global climate. It is therefore vital that all

countries give much greater impetus to developing

alternate energy sources, increase investment and

implement real measures to address climate change.

The issue of climate change for Pacific island

nations is a threat to international peace and security.

The preamble to the United Nations Charter stipulates

that a primary purpose of the United Nations is to

maintain international peace and security. The Security

Council is charged with protecting human rights,

together with ensuring the integrity and security of

States. It is the paramount international forum

available to Pacific island countries in which to draw

attention to the dangers that their islands and

populations face due to the adverse effects of climate

change.

We do not expect the Security Council to become

involved in the details of the discussions in the context

of the United Nations Framework Convention on

Climate Change, but we do expect the Security Council

to keep the matter under continuous review so as to

ensure that all countries contribute to solving the

climate change problem and that their efforts match

their resources and capacities. We also expect that the

Security Council will review particularly sensitive

issues such as the implications of the loss of land and

resources and the displacement of people for

sovereignty and international legal rights.

Nauru has incorporated the Millennium

Development Goals (MDGs) into its national

sustainable development strategy. Pacific island

countries, including Nauru, are struggling in many

areas of the MDGs as a consequence of the recent fuel

and food crises and the effects of climate change.

We lament the fact that the gap between promise

and implementation continues to frustrate our

achievement of the full range of internationally agreed

development goals that are particularly relevant to

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small island developing States. It is extremely

distressing that those goals were determined by

consensus of the international community yet

developed countries have yet to contribute the 0.7 per

cent of gross national income committed to assist

developing countries in meeting their targets.

On the eve of the high-level event on the

Millennium Development Goals, may I call on the

United Nations once more to rededicate itself to

making development one of the highest priorities of the

Organization. I would remind the United Nations of its

commitment to open a total of eight new offices in

Pacific island countries. We hope that the Organization

will not waiver in its commitment to support our

national priorities in meeting the MDGs and provide us

with the urgently needed international civil servants to

help with our pursuit of sustainable development and

poverty alleviation.

Sixty-three years after the United Nations was

founded on the noble ideals of establishing a peaceful,

free and tolerant global order, the world community

still suffers from the scourges of war, poverty,

oppression and discrimination, even as it faces today’s

colossal global challenges that threaten our very

existence. If the United Nations is to remain devoted to

the ideals upon which it was founded, it is absolutely

critical that it be reformed through the revitalization

and empowerment of the General Assembly. If the

United Nations is to remain a defender of human rights

and international peace, it is crucial that the Security

Council be expanded to better reflect geo-political

realities of the modern world. That would mean giving

permanent seats to Japan, India, Germany and Brazil.

If the United Nations prides itself on being an

inclusive Organization that champions the rights of

everyone, it cannot continue to deny the fundamental

right of Taiwan’s 23 million people to participate in the

specialized agencies of the United Nations. It is clear

to all of us that cross-Strait relations have been

improving since May 2008 and that leaders from both

sides have openly shown a willingness to work

together to create a positive atmosphere. It is now time

for the United Nations to find a solution to the

exclusion of Taiwan. Only by allowing Taiwan to

participate meaningfully in the specialized agencies of

the United Nations can the principle of universality and

democratization of the Organization be fulfilled, and

regional peace and prosperity ensured.

It is very simple and straightforward: we have

vowed to the people, now let us keep our promise.