Samoa, 2013

I congratulate you,

Mr. President, on your election to the presidency of the

General Assembly. I also wish also to thank you for your

continued strong support for small island developing

States (SIDS) issues, which you have championed for

many years and have once again demonstrated, this

week, in the process and lead-up to the United Nations

Third International Conference on Small Island

Developing States, to be held in the Pacific next year.

From economic woes to outright poverty, from

social instability to acts of violence and ethnic or

religious conflict, and from the devastation of natural

disasters to deadly acts of terrorism, no country is

spared or completely shielded. The events in Kenya,

Iraq, Pakistan and here in the United States over the past

week demonstrate the multiple risks we face in today’s

world. Our sympathies go to the Governments and

people of those countries, and our deepest condolences

to the people who lost family and friends in those tragic

events.

While the Organization continues to grapple with

various serious problems that require collective, United

Nations-led action for their resolution, perhaps the

greatest threat we face today is climate change. Climate

change is a security risk of far greater proportions than

many people are prepared to admit. For some low-lying

Pacific island countries, climate change may well lead

to their eventual extinction as sovereign States.

The singular importance and urgency of climate

change to our region was given added prominence today

when Pacific Forum leaders met with Secretary-General

Ban Ki-moon. Our Chair, the President of the Republic

of the Marshall Islands, presented to the Secretary-

General the Majuro Declaration for Climate Leadership,

which is an effort by our region — the most likely to be

first and worst affected by climate change — to launch

a new wave of more determined leadership across the

globe, aimed at accelerating the reduction and phasing

down of the world’s greenhouse-gas pollution before it

is too late.

The root causes of climate change and the means for

addressing them are widely known. We in the Pacific

know already from bitter and harsh experience, as will

many other parts of the world, what the consequences

of climate change are, and they will only become more

severe if not enough is done.

Sadly, what is evident to us in the climate change

negotiations is the continued triumph of vested interests

in preventing and delaying the action that should be

taken. In a diverse world of different capacities and

capabilities, those least able to mitigate and adapt to

the impacts of climate change look to Member States

in leadership roles to rise to the challenge and lead by

example, to ensure that the post-2020 climate change

convention currently being negotiated will effectively

address the mounting fears of countries like mine of

the catastrophic effects of climate change if it is not

tackled collectively and with determination. As world

leaders, we have the responsibility for fashioning a new

agreement that will reassure low-lying islands that we

have their interests and priorities at heart. Let us rise to

the occasion and be part of the solution.

In June, during the historic event of the signing of

the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), Samoa announced that

it would sign the Treaty at the highest political level

during the Treaty event at the General Assembly’s

current session. We kept that promise, and I signed

for Samoa in a special ceremony two days ago. We

welcome the fact that more than 100 nations, including

the United States, have now signed the Treaty.

For small island countries like Samoa, it takes

only a few small arms and light weapons in the wrong

hands to cause instability. Indeed, within our own

Pacific region, such so-called small arms have fuelled

conflicts, disrupted the lives of communities and

impeded countries’ development. The Arms Trade

Treaty, when fully implemented, will greatly help small

island States like mine in their efforts to sustain our

communities’ security and stability. Our signing of the

ATT is also further testimony to our firm commitment

to general and complete disarmament, since it will

contribute significantly to saving lives, stopping human

rights abuses and avoiding crises, and is an important

step in reducing and eventually eliminating altogether

the human cost of conventional arms.

Samoa remains fully committed to the peacekeeping

work of the United Nations, one of the Organization’s

most effective and successful mandates. For more than

10 years, Samoa has been contributing civilian police

officers to peacekeeping operations in countries such

as South Sudan, Timor-Leste, Liberia, the Sudan and,

in the Pacific, the Regional Assistance Mission to

the Solomon Islands. We will be in a better position

to increase our contribution to peacekeeping missions

after a United Nations selection, assistance and

assessment team has completed its evaluation, which is

planned to take place before the end of 2013, of eligible

officers from our police force.

Samoa looks forward to next week’s High-level

Dialogue on International Migration and Development.

International migration poses both challenges and

opportunities for countries of origin, transit and

destination. Its contribution to sustainable development

will therefore ultimately depend upon the willingness

of source and destination countries to work out

imaginative and humane arrangements that benefit

both those countries and migrants. Samoa is working

closely with New Zealand and Australia, through

their seasonal-worker schemes, to ensure that those

important initiatives result in mutual benefit for both

the sending and receiving parties in the arrangements.

Yesterday’s High-level Meeting on Nuclear

Disarmament (A/68/PV.11) highlighted yet again the

urgent need for a treaty banning nuclear weapons,

given the catastrophic humanitarian consequences

of any use of such weapons. Such weapons represent

the great paradox of our time. While nations desire

peace and talk of peace, far more of the national wealth

goes towards the development and acquisition of ever

more sophisticated and destructive weapons of mass

destruction. Our Pacific region was the scene of a great

deal of nuclear testing, with some islands still bearing

the scars of those tests. Our regional response was the

South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty, the Rarotonga

Treaty, to ensure that nuclear testing in the Pacific

would be a thing of the past.

Samoa reaffirms its continued support for a

nuclear-test-free world. Early agreement must be

reached to ban nuclear testing and to cease the creation

and manufacture of more nuclear weapons.

We place great faith in the rule of law and the vital

protection it offers to all States, especially to weak

and small countries such as mine, with no armed force

and not affiliated with any military grouping. The

International Criminal Court (ICC) is an important

part of the architecture of world peace based on the

rule of law, and we are pleased to have been the second

State party to ratify the two Kampala amendments to

the Rome Statute last year. With the deposit yesterday

of the ninth instrument of ratification, we hope that

the Kampala amendments will come into force soon

and that the ICC will become the first court since the

international military tribunals in Nuremburg and

Tokyo to hold individuals responsible for crimes of

aggression.

The United Nations needs to adapt to the changing

contemporary international environment or risk being

bypassed in favour of institutions and groupings that

are more responsive to the needs of Member States. The

High-level Political Forum is one such welcome reform,

and Samoa is very pleased to have participated in its

inaugural meeting this week.

Still more fundamental reform is required to address

the existing imbalances in the current power structure

of the Security Council through the enlargement of

both categories of membership and improvements to

its working methods, so as to reflect the realities of

the present time and to enhance the Council’s role and

effectiveness.

The renewed efforts made and great courage

shown in the process of restarting the stalled Middle

East peace plan for the Israeli and Palestinian peoples

has our strongest endorsement. It gives rise to hope

that the two-State solution, which is the only option

with realistic prospects for lasting peace, can still be

achieved.

The number of areas of tension and trouble

spots around the globe is increasing, and they are

getting deadlier. The availability of weapons of mass

destruction and, now, their use in Syria is unnerving.

The untold suffering brought about by the Syrian

crisis has touched many hearts, and the latest episode,

where we watched in utter disbelief the use of chemical

weapons to kill indiscriminately defenceless victims

and even children, is incomprehensible.

We therefore welcome the joint proposal by the

United States and Russia and the willingness of

Syria to have its chemical weapons destroyed under

the competent United Nations authority. We expect

total compliance, which is required for this initiative

to succeed. As long as weapons of mass destruction

such as chemical weapons continue to exist, some

megalomaniac will sooner or later resort to their use,

with deadly consequences for the world. The ultimate

safeguard is, of course, the destruction of all such

weapons, whether chemical, biological or nuclear.

The United Nations Conference on Sustainable

Development called for the convening in 2014 of a Third

International Conference on Small Island Developing

States, to remind the international community that small

island developing States (SIDS) face unique challenges

and vulnerabilities requiring dedicated support and to

help build their resilience.

Samoa is honoured to host that Conference in

September 2014, on behalf of the Pacific small island

developing countries. The Barbados interregional

meeting endorsed “The sustainable development of

small island developing States through genuine and

durable partnerships” as the overarching theme of the

Conference. A renewed global partnership will help

SIDS to manage a multitude of risks, so that they can

pursue inclusive economic growth, social development

and environmental sustainability.

Samoa has also proposed to utilize the Conference

as a platform to launch specific, concrete SIDS

partnerships as the most effective means to implement

some of the group’s challenges and as a legacy of the

Conference.

In advancing the SIDS development agenda,

the Samoa Conference strategically provides a

window for SIDS as a group to agree on their

priorities and to consolidate their positions ahead of

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s leaders’ summit on

climate change in 2014, the post-2015 United Nations

development agenda now under discussion, and the

negotiations for a successor climate-change treaty post-

2020, which are in progress.

Let me conclude by conveying our gratitude to

all our partners — developed and developing, big

and small, Governments and non-governmental

organizations, civil society and the private sector — for

their dedicated support, which has helped my country

to reach a new threshold in its journey as a State

Member of the United Nations. Our new status as a

non-least developed country beyond January 2014 can

be sustained only with the support of Samoa’s truly

genuine and durable partners.