Syria, 2000

It

gives me great pleasure to congratulate you, Sir, on

your election to the presidency of this General

Assembly session. We are confident that the posts you

have assumed in your country and the international

respect that you enjoy will facilitate the task entrusted

to you in leading the deliberations of this session of the

General Assembly to their desired objectives.

I would also like to express our appreciation to

the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Namibia for his

efforts in leading the work of the previous session to a

successful conclusion. I would be remiss if I failed to

thank the Secretary-General, Mr. Kofi Annan, for his

efforts to maintain the principles and purposes of the

Charter and for the distinguished role he has played in

crystallizing the idea of convening the Millennium

Summit last week. It was indeed an unusual event in

United Nations history.

The historic Millennium Summit Declaration

confirmed unequivocally and clearly the commitment

of all the Heads of State and Government of the world

to the principles and purposes of the Charter of the

United Nations. We believe that the absence of any

substantial difference between the Charter and the

Declaration is an important achievement in itself. The

historic Declaration issued by the Millennium Summit

may be considered, in one way or another, as a

renewed vote of confidence in the Charter, particularly,

as the world has recently witnessed major changes and

dangerous challenges. One may therefore conclude that

the principles and purposes adopted by peoples and

nations do not undergo major changes with the passage

of time.

It would be wrong to underestimate the

significance of this conclusion for the history of the

United Nations. The end of the cold war did not

prevent the peoples and nations of the world from

denouncing and condemning crimes of aggression,

ethnic-cleansing, foreign occupation, oppression,

extremism, injustice, corruption, racism and double

standards. Nor did this make us hesitate to glorify

many noble objectives, such as freedom, peace,

equality, solidarity, tolerance, human rights and social

justice.

It is fortunate that third world countries and poor

countries host large populations with bountiful

resources and great heritage. This constitutes a safety

net for those countries that were able to contribute to

maintaining the principles and purposes of the United

Nations when drafting the Millennium Declaration.

This explains the lack of any reference to the new

world order, either in the Millennium Summit

Declaration or in any other official text. Regrettably,

however, this becomes evident in reality, whereby

hegemony seems to have the upper hand in the

international arena.

Strengthening the role of the United Nations was

the main topic on the Summit's agenda. This role

would also become clear in reforming the Security

18

Council and expanding its membership. The United

Nations membership considers the Council the

Organization's primary organ. This reform process

should be accomplished by expanding the Security

Council membership, the granting of equitable and fair

geographical representation and the gradual phasing

out of the use of the right of veto, which contradicts the

concept of democracy, particularly when its aim is

nothing short of undermining the democratic process.

United Nations peacekeeping operations have

contributed to creating conditions conducive to ending

the deterioration of security conditions in many

countries of the world. Throughout the past years, the

Syrian Arab Republic has done everything it could to

preserve the security and safety of United Nations

peacekeeping personnel and to ensure that they

successfully carry out their missions and mandates. But

peacekeeping operations must be confined to enforcing

United Nations resolutions and those of international

legitimacy. The Security Council has therefore to

enforce its resolutions so that peacekeeping operations

will not simply become operations to impose the status

quo, which makes the achievement of true peace a very

elusive objective.

The peace process launched in Madrid has been

losing its momentum, incentive and compass, day after

day and year after year. The Security Council, which

has the authority and international legitimacy to

enforce its own resolutions, has been kept out of the

Middle East peace process. It has become a silent

witness to the fact that the peace process in the Middle

East has reached a dead end.

It has become quite obvious to all those involved

in the peace process, both inside and outside our

region, that continued Israeli occupation of Arab

territories which is sometimes explained by Israel's

psychological need for security and at other times by

superstitious myths is the major obstacle on the road

to peace. Those futile claims, which have no

foundation in reality whatsoever, have caused the peace

process to become an endless negotiating process with

neither end nor resolution in sight.

At any rate, the serious and carefully considered

negotiations that Syria has conducted have proven to

the international community at large, and to Arabs in

particular, two main things: first, that Israel is neither

desirous of, nor serious about, pursuing a just and

comprehensive peace in accordance with United

Nations resolutions; and, secondly, that Syria has the

right to a full return of the entire Golan, to the 4 June

1967 line, without concessions or compromises.

We would like to mention another fact known to

our foes and friends alike. That fact is that Syria has

unreservedly supported every Arab and Palestinian

right during every stage of the peace talks. It did not

take those positions to embarrass anyone or to

negotiate on their behalf. As a matter of principle,

Syria has been, and continues to be, committed to the

inalienable rights of the Palestinian people to return to

their lands, to self-determination, and to establish their

independent State on their national soil. On that basis,

Syria presented its position clearly and firmly at the

meeting of the Jerusalem Committee that was convened

in Morocco at the end of last month in support of the

rights of Muslims and Arabs to full and

uncompromised Palestinian sovereignty over Al-Quds

Al-Sharif.

The Arabs are an ancient and time-honoured

nation known for its religious tolerance. But tolerance

is one thing and conceding one's rights is something

else. Territory and sovereignty are matters of national

dignity that can never be forfeited or compromised.

At the Millennium Summit, the countries of the

world expressed their belief that we live today in an

age of international law and under the United Nations

Charter, international legitimacy and human rights, and

not in an age of the law of the jungle and futile

religious claims to justify the usurpation of other

peoples' land by force. This requires from the

international community and the United Nations a

more firm and non-selective stand in defending the

Charter and international law and in prompting Israel

to respect international legitimacy and international

conventions and to implement the resolutions of the

United Nations.

The brotherly Lebanese people have achieved a

historic milestone, thanks to their solidarity and that of

their State, in strongly resisting Israeli occupation.

Syria stood by Lebanon firmly in order to ensure the

full implementation of resolution 425 (1978). Syria

will always stand by Lebanon and support all its

national issues, especially the ones concerning the

return of all its territory and the return of its hostages

held in Israeli jails. In this regard, we urge the donor

countries to fulfil their commitments to help Lebanon

rebuild what Israel has destroyed, particularly the

19

damage it caused during its occupation of southern

Lebanon.

From this international forum, Syria would like

once again to stress the great importance it attaches to

maintaining the territorial integrity of Iraq. We call for

relieving the suffering of the Iraqi people by lifting the

economic sanctions that only affect the people. We also

stand against any measures taken against Iraq outside

the context of United Nations resolutions so that those

resolutions will retain the necessary credibility to bring

about their implementation.

We also deem it necessary to find a just and

humane solution to the question of Kuwaiti and other

prisoners of war, within a practical framework agreed

upon between the Kuwaiti and Iraqi sides. We do not

want the issue of prisoners of war and missing persons

to remain outside the human and political framework

that will allow us to arrive at a solution.

Syria also calls upon the Security Council to

quickly and permanently lift the sanctions it imposed

against Libya. Libya has delivered on all its

commitments under Security Council resolutions. We

fully support Libya's demands.

In view of the strong, brotherly relations between

Syria, the United Arab Emirates and the Islamic

Republic of Iran, we call upon the two neighbouring

countries to pursue negotiations to resolve peacefully

the dispute over the three islands on the basis of the

principles of good neighbourliness and mutual respect.

Syria believes that the establishment of a trilateral

committee to pave the way for direct negotiations

between Iran and the United Arab Emirates through the

creation of favourable conditions is a practical

initiative. We hope that it will allow the two parties to

arrive at a satisfactory conclusion.

We would like to welcome the achievements of

the representatives of Somalia in forming a temporary

Somali parliament and electing Mr. AbdiKassim Salad

Hassan as President of democratic Somalia. We

consider these achievements as major pillars for the

restoration of Somali State institutions. We call upon

the international community to redouble its efforts to

help Somalis carry out the tasks of reconstruction and

rehabilitation.

The continued tragic situation in Afghanistan is a

source of great concern to us. We are convinced that

the problem of Afghanistan can only be solved by

stopping the fighting and beginning negotiations aimed

at achieving national reconciliation. It must also be

solved by finding an acceptable and permanent

political settlement that brings about security and

stability for the Afghan people. Many Arab and Islamic

countries fear that continued and senseless fighting in

Afghanistan may lead to undermining the concept of

the State in that country and to destroying its heritage

and whatever is left of its historic traditions.

Syria welcomes the discussions convened at the

highest level in Pyongyang in June 2000. We express

the hope that this rapprochement between the two

Koreas will contribute to achieving the aspirations of

the Korean people in reunifying the peninsula through

peaceful means.

There was a consensus in the statements delivered

at the Millennium Summit and in the Summit

Declaration about the need to exert all possible efforts

to rid humanity of the humiliating and inhumane

conditions of extreme poverty, in which more than a

billion people live. The Summit stressed the

commitment of Member States to basic human rights,

as well as to the right of every country to development.

We think this will require developing a new economic

international order that is just, fair and democratic. It

will also require finding a multilateral commercial and

financial system characterized by transparency,

equality and non-discrimination. We must also find the

best mechanism possible to solve developmental

problems, especially on the African continent. Such a

system should also give preferential treatment to

developing countries in order to facilitate investment

and the transfer of technology and know-how. That

would allow for full, effective and equal participation

by the South in the process of decision-making at the

international level. Although these requests seem far-

fetched now, they will in the final analysis serve all

parties and States, whether they be rich or poor, in the

North or in the South.

We had fervently hoped that a just and

comprehensive peace in the Middle East would have

been achieved by the beginning of the twenty-first

century and with the ushering in of this new

millennium. Nonetheless, we remain optimistic. Peace

will remain our strategic choice and that of all peoples

who aspire to a bright future in which peace, security

and prosperity prevail for human beings everywhere.