Nicaragua, 2010

In the name of the Nicaraguan people and of

Comrade President Commander Daniel Ortega

Saavedra, I convey my warmest brotherly greetings to

you, Sir, and to each and every one of the peoples and

Governments represented in the General Assembly.

As the shadows of apocalyptic threats darken the

world stage, we begin to doubt the capacity for reason

and the strength of the most noble sentiments of human

beings to face up to the serious problems confronting

humanity. Various types of information are

manipulated by the global communications media in

order to continually discredit the independence efforts

of the Governments of the South. They disseminate the

idea that humanity is impotent in the face of the

present state of disaster and that we must prepare for

the worst. Furthermore, what is worse is that they tell

us that no one is responsible and that it is a faceless

disaster, seeking thus to exonerate the industrialized

countries of the North.

However, we know full well that the underlying

cause of the serious crises we are experiencing is the

nature of the system of economic, political and social

relations established by global capitalism and the effort

to have that system accepted as a universal paradigm.

In this regard, the poor countries, which are

referred to by the euphemism “developing countries”,

can strip away the masks of those who — driven by

greed, selfishness and the desire for absolute power in

the name of manifest destiny or of divine reason —

have brought humankind to the brink of extinction.

Nicaragua, which has experienced the pain and

injustice of war first-hand, is against war. We do not

accept the failure of reason. We do not accept war as

the obligatory language among peoples. Nicaragua

rejects war as a solution to conflicts between States.

We reject war as a means for appropriating the planet’s

natural resources or for imposing the hegemony of a

few over the majority of the world’s nations. War will

never lead to solutions partial or full, much less

definitive. The invasion of Iraq by foreign troops under

false pretexts has brought neither peace nor stability to

that country. On the contrary, it has left that country in

ruins and failed to bring greater stability to the region.

The war in Afghanistan has become a dead end

for the occupiers. At the same time, it has also had

negative effects on its neighbours. Security Council

resolution 1929 (2010), which imposes new sanctions

on the Islamic Republic of Iran, has only served to

increase the possibility of a large-scale military

conflict with unforeseeable consequences. The war

games on the Korean peninsula increase tensions in

that region, jeopardizing the gains achieved between

the two Koreas. Neither Europe nor the Persian Gulf

has escaped the expanding zone of militarization.

Similarly, the establishment of military bases and the

deployment of naval and air power on Latin American

soil threaten the political stability of our nations.

“Among individuals, as among nations, respect

for the rights of others is peace”. This saying of Benito

Juárez, President of Mexico and the first indigenous

president in the Americas, clearly reflects the

conception of and will for peace among the peoples of

the world. This apothegm should guide our

Organization, and in particular the Security Council,

ensuring that their actions adhere strictly to the

purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Moreover, Nicaragua believes that there is a close

relation between disarmament and development. Our

commitment to security includes a commitment to the

promotion of human rights, which we interpret as

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tantamount to sustainable development centred on the

human being and implemented in an environment of

good governance with direct citizen participation and

social equality, which are indispensable to real

development.

From our point of view, the resources freed up as

a result of disarmament efforts should be directed to

ensuring the attainment of the national social

development goals of each of our countries. One only

has to take a brief glance at the trillions of dollars

spent on war to realize how many human problems

could be solved with these funds, alleviating the pain

caused by poverty and exclusion. The global economic

and financial crisis has had little or no effect on global

military spending.

Nicaragua remains actively committed to the

cause of general and complete disarmament. Nicaragua

believes that only a climate of fundamental trust and

solidarity can guarantee strict compliance with arms

control and disarmament accords with a view to

attaining complete disarmament — and especially

nuclear disarmament — as the only option for

achieving real and lasting world peace. Nicaragua

supports the inalienable right of the parties to the

Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons to

use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes and without

discrimination. Nicaragua encourages actions to

promote the exchange of material resources, equipment

and technology for the peaceful use of nuclear energy

in order to guarantee the sustainable economic

development of every nation and the world.

Precisely because of this belief, Nicaragua

demands that neither Iran nor any other nation be taken

to task for developing nuclear programmes for peaceful

purposes. It is possible to build trust based on dialogue

and negotiation. In this context, Nicaragua joins the

general support expressed for the tripartite declaration

of Brazil, Turkey and Iran, which constitutes an

alternative for promoting regional and world peace.

That which was a warning yesterday is today a

reality. The present international context is leading to a

global political crisis. The entire political model

constructed and articulated around the paradigm of

neo-liberalism, globalization and the free market is in

question. At the global level, we need more decisive

action to affirm multilateralism as the new paradigm.

Such multilateralism must listen to the voices of

peoples living in extreme poverty and

underdevelopment. It must take the new political

realities into account and effectively democratize the

world order, beginning with this Organization,

including the Security Council and the United Nations

as a whole; re-establish the representational and

democratic rights of its 192 Member States; and

identify the rights and obligations that are common to

all States without undermining their sovereignty,

independence and self-determination, regardless of

their size.

In Latin America and the Caribbean, this trend is

manifest in the process of integration and unity taking

place among our peoples. We have already made the

historic decision to create the Latin American and

Caribbean Community of States, whose

institutionalization will begin next year and conclude

in 2012. This is further and unquestionable proof of the

profound changes taking place in the world.

The Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our

America has become the vanguard of this process of

change. The struggle against intervention of all kinds,

including military intervention, and for the

maintenance and re-establishment of peace is an

essential component of the Alliance’s action in its

relations with the world, and strengthens its capacity to

guarantee the national sovereignty of its peoples.

Nicaragua joins the brotherly people of Puerto

Rico in waving the flag of its independence which has

been unjustly trampled. The criminal economic

blockade by the Government of the United States of

America against the brotherly people and Government

of heroic Cuba must stop immediately, and the five

Cuban heroes, counter-terrorism combatants

imprisoned in United States jails, must be released

now.

We express our solidarity with the brotherly

people of Argentina in their demand for sovereignty

over the Malvinas Islands and with the brotherly

people of the Democratic Arab Saharan Republic in

their quest to be recognized as an independent State.

The war and State terrorism against the people of

Palestine must immediately cease. All Security Council

and General Assembly resolutions concerning Israel

must be respected and complied with. We must tie the

hands of those who fan the flames of hatred and war

and are capable of attacking a humanitarian flotilla —

an act that has been denounced by the Human Rights

Council commission of inquiry.

31 10-55128

We salute the invitation extended by the

international community to Taiwan to participate in the

work of some United Nations specialized agencies

directly related to the well-being of the 23 million

Taiwanese. In this regard, we call on the United

Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

and the International Civil Aviation Organization to

adopt a similar position.

Never before have we had so much information

or, I hope, been so conscious of the severity of the

environmental crisis affecting our planet. Our

awareness of the gravity of the situation makes it

indispensable that we forge a coalition of forces based

on the common values and inspiring principles that

serve as the ethical foundation and catalyst for

practices to promote a sustainable way of life. The

Earth, with its minerals and sources of energy; with its

land, water, forests and marine life; with its ecosystems

and micro-organisms, must be recognized as our

supreme and universal benefactor and an integral part

of humankind, and not only as a source of survival.

Global capitalism, with its logic of competition

and unlimited growth and its unsustainable modes of

production and consumption, separates human beings

from nature and establishes a relationship of dominion

over it. This situation must change and be restored to

the right track before it is too late for us all.

The meeting in Copenhagen demonstrated the

power of the interests that block decisive action on

climate change and the rights of Mother Earth. It left

us with the unpleasant feeling that we had wasted our

time and that those who impede the urgent solutions

needed to address the critical state of Mother Earth are

uncommitted to change. With our eyes fixed on hope,

we continue to promote our commitments based on the

fundamental principle of common but differentiated

responsibilities. These should be proportional to the

greenhouse gas emissions accumulated since the onset

of the Industrial Revolution and not since last year.

Those who have historically caused the damage should

assume most of the responsibility.

In that hope, Nicaragua was the first country of

the world to have signed the Universal Declaration of

the Rights of Mother Earth, and calls on all the

countries of the world to sign it. It was also in that

hope that Nicaragua signed the People’s Agreement

adopted in Cochabamba in April during the World

People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights

of Mother Earth. It is in that hope that Nicaragua trusts

that, when we arrive in Cancún, we will be united in

seeking agreements that will at least partially reverse

the harm, and in taking a path that re-establishes the

lost or gravely endangered balance between humankind

and Mother Earth.

Although it is proclaimed without much support

that the worst of the global economic and financial

crisis is behind us, its most serious effects remain and

continue to greatly affect our peoples. We should not

continue to accept the imposition of economic models

based on the pillage and exploitation of our riches.

For all of those reasons, Nicaragua and most of

the Latin American nations are dedicated to building an

alternative model of economic sovereignty, a sphere of

interdependence and solidarity that will enable us to

face global capitalism’s profound crisis and to recover

our capacity to determine our own paths to

development. We reaffirm that the development

strategies of each country are their own responsibility,

that they should have national ownership and

leadership, and that foreign cooperation should be in

line with the strategies, plans and objectives of the

country that receives it.

In connection with the urgent need to create a

new model, we reiterate our support for the outcome of

the Conference on the World Financial and Economic

Crisis and Its Impact on Development of June 2009

(resolution 63/303, annex). There can be no economic

recovery or balance in the inequality with the present

model, which concentrates the income and wealth

among and within nations.

All of this should take place in a framework of

mutual respect, devoid of punitive political conditions

against our peoples that would block and stifle the

development of the countries of the South.

Besides the hundreds of millions of people in the

world who suffer from hunger, we have before us the

terrifying reality that in developing countries,

10.9 million children under the age of five die every

year. Malnutrition and hunger-related diseases cause

60 per cent of those deaths. The cost of malnutrition to

national economic development is estimated at

between $20 and $30 billion per year. That intolerable

situation must stop. The developed countries must

fulfil their commitments to eliminate the suffering of

millions of human beings.

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Nicaragua reaffirms its decision to confront, with

the means available to it and in the context of its

national sovereignty, the different forms of

transnational organized crime, which have become a

permanent threat to domestic and international security.

Similarly, Nicaragua reiterates its position of

combating terrorism in all its forms and whatever their

source.

There are several processes that are hampering

necessary and urgent changes. The most prominent is

the suppression of information — not saying anything

in order to perpetuate ignorance. And when

information is made available, it is distorted and

always against the peoples’ interests and their

legitimate aspirations and experiences, thus converting

lies into truths and vice versa, converting a smile into a

sneer, words into noise and an objective fact into

virtual reality.

The universal citizen is witness, through global

communication, to a real war for truth and freedom,

forced to confront a permanent, slanderous campaign

against change, against hope and against the proper

evolution of history. That campaign has far-reaching

implications and has the goal of destroying the process

of direct popular democracy and of the profound and

revolutionary social transformations that are taking

place in our countries as a result of the triumph of

revolutionary political forces, as is the case in

Nicaragua with the Sandinista Front. We must

denounce the campaign waged by hegemonic and

selfish interests in a few countries in an attempt to

undermine the legitimacy of our political system and

our people’s Government.

Nicaragua proclaims its right to live in peace and

to combat the poverty, illiteracy, hunger and

malnutrition generated by historic exclusion and the

imposition of an economic and political model that is

alien to our reality. Nicaragua declares its dignity,

sovereignty, self-determination, respect, unity and

solidarity with all the peoples of the Earth, as

guaranteed by the United Nations Charter. Nicaragua is

working to develop a social awareness of solidarity

identified with the ideals of humankind, justice,

freedom and democracy for all, without exception.

From this forum, Nicaragua makes a vehement

call for world peace, for the survival of the human

species, for the dignified future of the noblest

aspirations of men and women. That is the only

possible future.