Kingdom of the Netherlands

Mr President, Your Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen, I stand before you as a proud new participant in what, for many of you, is now a familiar gathering....

In 1864. Abraham Lincoln wrote a letter to Edwin Stanton, his Secretary of War. He observed that “you cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it...

Growing up in Europe as a child of the Cold War, the Iron Curtain was a fact of life, and I still vividly remember when the first breaches began to appear in th...

This spring, after a year in the grip of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, we looked forward to the summer. We were full of hope and anticipation. De...

Mr President, Secretary-General, Your Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, [PM] For me, the General Assembly in New York is the ultimate UN experience. All the d...

During the general debate of the General Assembly, all the States Members of the United Nations make their voices heard, and I am proud to be standing in this H...

In 1999, in his message for the New Millennium, the late Kofi Annan spoke words that still ring true almost two decades later: “More than ever before in human h...

Every era and every decade has its problems, great and small. The problems we face now seem overwhelming. These days many people worry about the future, which i...

Before I came here, Sahar Afzal, a representative of Dutch youth, asked me a simple question. “Minister,” he said, “do you still believe in the United Nations?”...

It is a privilege to address the General Assembly on behalf of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, a Kingdom made up of four autonomous countries — the Netherlands,...

On 17 July, in a summer already marked by alarming reports from Syria, Iraq and Gaza, our country was confronted with a stark international reality. The 298...

This year, we celebrate the centennial of the Peace Palace in The Hague, seat of the International Court of Justice (ICC) and the Permanent Court of Arbitrat...

Last month, I visited a refugee camp at the border between Turkey and Syria. I met children, women and men, who told me how they had escaped the violence and s...

In May I visited Tunisia, the cradle of the revolutions that have spread across the Arab world. I spoke to many people there who told me about their deep yea...

The Headquarters of the United Nations is currently undergoing a major renovation, and that is a good thing. It is good because the building no longer meets ...

A few weeks ago, the Empire State Building was lit up in orange, the national colour of the Netherlands. The reason was that, precisely 400 years ago, the Du...

When the present session of the General Assembly began on Tuesday, the Secretary-General made important remarks about the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)...

I would like to begin by congratulating Mr. Kerim on his election as President of the General Assembly. I would also like to wish our Secretary-General, Mr. ...

Five years after the destruction of the Twin Towers and just a few days after the commemoration of that terrible tragedy, I would like to extend my deepest s...

It is my firm opinion that we achieved important results at our summit. We created a peacebuilding commission and agreed to establish a human rights council. We...