United States, 1996

Three years ago I had the honour

of being the first American President born after the

founding of the United Nations to address the General

Assembly. In its fifty-first year, the United Nations has not

yet realized all its founders’ aspirations. But the ideals of

the United Nations Charter — peace, freedom, tolerance

and prosperity — now touch more people in more nations

than ever before.

Now we find ourselves at a turning point in history

when the blocs and barriers that long defined the world are

giving way to an age of remarkable possibility — a time

when more of our children and more nations will be able to

live out their dreams than ever before. But this is also an

age of new threats — threats from terrorists, from rogue

States that support them, threats from ethnic, religious,

racial and tribal hatreds, threats from international

criminals and drug traffickers — all of whom will be

more dangerous if they gain access to weapons of mass

destruction.

The challenge before us, plainly, is twofold: to seize

the new opportunities for more people to enjoy peace and

freedom, security and prosperity and to move strongly

and swiftly against the dangers that change has produced.

This week and in this place, we take a giant step

forward. By overwhelming global consensus, we will

make a solemn commitment to end all nuclear tests for all

time.

Before entering this Hall, I had the great honour to

be the first leader to sign the Comprehensive Test-Ban

Treaty (CTBT). I did so, with some pride, with this pen,

for this pen is the very one that President Kennedy used

to help bring the limited test-ban Treaty to life 33 years

ago.

This Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty will help

prevent the nuclear Powers from developing more

advanced and more dangerous weapons. It will limit the

ability of other States to acquire such devices themselves.

It points us towards a century in which the roles and risks

of nuclear weapons can be further reduced and ultimately

eliminated.

I want to thank all those who helped bring us to this

day, especially the Chairman of the comprehensive test-

ban negotiating Committee, Netherlands Ambassador

Ramaker, and the Government of Australia, which took the

lead at the United Nations.

I thank the Secretary-General for the remarks he made

this morning in establishing the criteria and standards in

support of the United Nations as the depository of the

Treaty.

The signatures of the world’s declared nuclear

Powers — the United States, China, France, Russia and the

United Kingdom — along with those of the vast majority

of its nations, will immediately create an international norm

against nuclear testing even before the Treaty formally

enters into force.

The CTBT is the shared work of hard negotiation.

Some have complained that it does not mandate total

nuclear disarmament by a date certain. I would say to them:

“Do not forsake the benefits of this achievement by

ignoring the tremendous progress we have already made

towards that goal.” Today there are no Russian missiles

pointed at America and no American missiles pointed at

Russia.

Through the START Treaties we are cutting our

nuclear arsenals by two thirds. Ukraine, Belarus and

Kazakstan are giving up the nuclear weapons left on their

land after the Soviet Union dissolved.

We are working with the newly independent States to

improve security at nuclear facilities and to convert nuclear

weapons to peaceful uses.

The United States and other nuclear-weapon States

have embraced the South Pacific and African nuclear-free

zones. Now half the world’s land area is nuclear free by

international agreement. And the world community

extended indefinitely the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of

Nuclear Weapons (NPT).

Yet some of the very changes that had made this

progress possible have also created new risks. The breakup

of the Soviet Union left nuclear materials dispersed

throughout the newly independent States. As barriers have

come down around the world the danger of nuclear

smuggling has gone up. So even as we reduce the global

stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, we must also

reduce the danger that lethal materials could wind up in the

wrong hands, while developing effective defences for our

people if that should happen.

The United States has six priority goals to further lift

the threat of nuclear weapons destruction and the threat of

weapons of mass destruction, and to limit their dangerous

spread.

First, we must protect our people from chemical

attack and make it harder for rogue States and terrorists

to brandish poison gas by bringing the chemical weapons

Convention into force as soon as possible. I thank the

nations here that have ratified the chemical weapons

Convention. I deeply regret that the United States Senate

has not yet voted on the Convention, but I want to assure

you and people throughout the world that I will not let

this treaty die, and we will join the ranks of nation

determined to prevent the spread of chemical weapons.

Secondly, we must reduce the risk that an outlaw

State or organization could build a nuclear device by

negotiating a treaty to freeze the production of fissile

materials for use in nuclear weapons. The Conference on

Disarmament should take up this challenge immediately.

The United States, Russia, France and the United

Kingdom already have halted production of fissile

materials for weapons. I urge other nations to end the

unsafeguarded production of these materials pending

completion of the treaty.

Thirdly, we must continue to reduce our nuclear

arsenals. When Russia ratifies START II, President

Yeltsin and I are all ready to discuss the possibilities of

further cuts, as well as limiting and monitoring nuclear

warheads and materials. This will help make deep

reductions irreversible.

Fourthly, we must reinforce our efforts against the

spread of nuclear weapons by strengthening the Treaty on

the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). We

should give the International Atomic Energy Agency a

stronger role and sharper tools for conducting worldwide

inspections. Our law enforcement and customs officials

should cooperate more in the fight against nuclear

smuggling. And I urge all nations that have not signed the

NPT to do so without delay.

Fifthly, we must better protect our people from those

who would use disease as a weapon of war, by giving the

biological weapons Convention the means to strengthen

compliance, including on-site investigations when we

believe such weapons may have been used or when

suspicious outbreaks of disease occur. We should aim to

complete this task by 1998.

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Finally, we must end the carnage caused by

anti-personnel landmines, the hidden killers that murder and

maim more than 25,000 people a year. In May, I announced

a series of actions the United States would take towards

this goal. Today, I renew my appeal for the swift

negotiation of a worldwide ban on the use, stockpiling,

production, and transfer of anti-personnel landmines. Our

children deserve to walk the Earth in safety.

Thirty-three years ago, at the height of the cold war,

President Kennedy spoke at American University in

Washington. Peace was the topic of his address, but not an

abstract ideal of peace. Instead, he urged us to focus on

“a more practical, attainable peace — based not on a

sudden revolution in human nature but on a gradual

evolution in human institutions — on a series of

concrete actions and effective agreements which are in

the interests of all concerned.”

It was in that same speech that he announced that talks

would shortly begin in Moscow on a comprehensive test-

ban treaty.

President Kennedy’s vision exceeded the possibilities

of his time, but his words speak to us still. As we sign our

names to the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty —

the longest-sought, hardest-fought prize in arms control

history — let us summon the confidence of earlier pioneers

and set our sights on the challenges of the new century.

Over the past three years we have moved in the right

direction in meeting those challenges. In Bosnia, where the

war is over and where just 10 days ago its people went to

the polls in peace, we have moved in the right direction.

Now we must help Bosnia build a unified, democratic, and

peaceful future.

In Haiti, where the dictators are gone, democracy is

back and the exodus of refugees has ended, we have move

in the right direction. Now we must help the Haitian people

seize the full benefits of freedom and forge a more

prosperous future. In the Middle East and in Northern

Ireland, there is progress towards lasting peace, and we are

moving in the right direction. Now we must support

continued progress between Israel and Palestinians, and we

must broaden the circle of peace to include more of Israel’s

neighbours. We must help to give the children of Belfast

the chance to live out normal lives.

In the fact that democracy, open markets and peace

are taking hold around the world, we are moving in the

right direction. Here in the Americas, every nation but

one has raised freedom’s flag. In Central Europe, in

Russia, Ukraine and the other new independent States, the

forces of reform have earned all our respect and will

continue to have the support of the United States. Now

we must begin to welcome Europe’s new democracies

into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO),

strengthen NATO’s partnership with Russia and build a

secure and undivided Europe.

In Asia, South Korea, Japan, China and America

working together persuaded North Korea to freeze its

nuclear programme under international monitoring. Now,

in the wake of provocative actions by North Korea, we

must pursue a permanent peace for all the Korean people.

Our planet is safer because of our common efforts to

close Chernobyl, to address the challenges of climate

change, to protect the world’s forests and oceans. Now

we must uphold our duty as custodians of our

environment so that our children will inherit an even

healthier planet.

All of us must continue our historic efforts to build

a better, more global trading system for the twenty-first

century. We have made remarkable progress, but there is

more to do in opening markets, in creating millions of

new jobs for all our people.

In this time of challenge and change, the United

Nations is more important than ever before, because our

world is more interdependent than ever before. Most

Americans know this. Unfortunately, some Americans, in

their longing to be free of the world’s problems, and

perhaps to focus more on our own problems, ignore what

the United Nations has done, ignore the benefits of

cooperation. They ignore our own interdependence with

all of you in charting a better future. They ignore all that

the United Nations is doing to lift the lives of millions by

preserving the peace, vaccinating children, caring for

refugees, sharing the blessings of progress around the

world. They have made it difficult for the United States

to meet its obligations to the United Nations. But let me

reassure all of you: the vast majority of Americans

support the United Nations, not only because it reflects

our own ideals, but because it reinforces our interests. We

must continue to work to manifest the support that our

people feel. For the fifty-first year in a row, the United

States will be the largest financial contributor to the

United Nations. We are paying our dues, and I am

committed to paying off our accumulated obligations.

However, we also support the process of reform, which

has done great work in reforming and streamlining the

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bureaucracy and reining in the budget, and it should

continue.

We also believe that all of us — the nations of the

world working together — must do more to fight terrorism.

Last year I asked the nations assembled here to commit to

a goal of zero tolerance for aggression, terrorism and

lawless behaviour. Frankly, we have not done that yet. Real

zero tolerance means giving no aid and no quarter to

terrorists who slaughter the innocent and drug traffickers

who poison our children, and doing everything we can to

prevent weapons of mass destruction from falling into the

wrong hands. Real zero tolerance requires us to isolate

States that refuse to play by the rules we have all accepted

for civilized behaviour. As long as Iraq threatens its

neighbours and its people, as long as Iran supports and

protects terrorists, as long as Libya refuses to give up the

people who blew up Pan Am 103, they should not become

full members of the family of nations.

The United States is pursuing a three-part strategy

against terrorists: abroad, by working more closely than

ever with like-minded nations; at home by giving our law

enforcement the toughest counter-terrorism tools available,

and by doing all we can to make our airports and the

aeroplanes that link us all together even safer. I have

requested more than $1 billion from our Congress to meet

these commitments, and we are implementing the United

States Vice President's aviation security plan to make those

travelling to, from and within the United States more

secure.

There are other steps we must take together. Last year,

I urged that together we crack down on money laundering

and front companies, shut down gray markets for guns,

explosives and false documents, open more law

enforcement centres around the world and strengthen

safeguards on lethal materials. In each of these areas we

have made progress, through the United Nations, at the

Summit of Peacemakers in Sharm el-Sheikh, at the Paris

terrorism conference and individually.

Now we should adopt the declaration on crime and

public security I proposed last year. It includes a no-

sanctuary pledge, so that we can say with one voice to the

terrorists, criminals and drug traffickers: “You have no

place to run, no place to hide.” I call on every Member to

ratify 11 international conventions that would help prevent

and punish terrorism and to criminalize the use of

explosives in terrorist attacks.

To every nation whose children fall prey to

drugs and every nation that makes those drugs: we must

do more to reduce demand and to take illegal drugs off

the market and off the streets. The United States will do

its part. Next week, I will target more than $100-million

worth of defence equipment, services and training to

Mexico, Colombia and other South American and

Caribbean countries.

These resources will help our friends stop the flow

of drugs at the source. Now I ask every nation that

exports the chemicals needed to make illicit drugs to

create an informal group whose members will work to

deny these chemicals to drug producers. We must not let

more drugs darken the dawn of the next century.

Our duty to fight all these forces of destruction is

directly linked to our efforts to reduce the threat of

weapons of mass destruction. We all know we are not

immune from this. We saw it when our friends in Japan

were subject to the murderous power of a small vial of

sarin gas unleashed in the Tokyo subway. We know a

small lump of plutonium is enough to build a nuclear

bomb. We know that more dangerous people have access

to materials of mass destruction because of the rapid

movement and open borders of this age. The quest to

eliminate these problems from the world’s arsenals and to

stop them from spreading has taken on a new and

powerful urgency for all of us.

So let us strengthen our determination to fight the

rogue States, the terrorists and the criminals who menace

our safety, our way of life and the potential of our

children in the twenty-first century. Let us recommit

ourselves to prevent them from acquiring weapons of

mass destruction. Let us work harder than ever to lift the

nuclear backdrop that has darkened the world’s stage for

too long now. Let us make these solemn tasks our

common obligation, our common commitment; if we do,

then together we will enter the twenty-first century

marching towards a better, safer world — the very better,

safer world the United Nations has sought to build for 51

years.