It is a great honour for me to be here today. The General Assembly is the place where the world opens up to dialogue and discussion, which are essential elements for peaceful coexistence among countries. As stated in the second preambular paragraph of the 1945 Charter of the United Nations, the objective of the United Nations is “to maintain international peace and security [and] promote the economic and social progress of all peoples”.
Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and the ensuing food, energy and economic crises are putting our collective ideals at risk in a way that has rarely happened since the end of the Cold War. Those crises stand alongside the other great challenges of our time — climate change, the coronavirus disease pandemic and inequality — and amplify their costs, especially for the most vulnerable.
Accountability for the conflict is clear and one-sided. It is our collective responsibility to find answers to those problems with urgency, determination and effectiveness. We cannot let ourselves be divided into North and South. We must act together and rediscover the value of multilateralism that is celebrated here in this Hall. The invasion of Ukraine violates the values and rules on which international security and civil coexistence among countries have rested for decades. We thought that we would no longer have to witness wars of aggression in Europe. Imperial ambitions, militarism and systematic violations of civil and human rights seemed to belong to the past century.
Since February, however, we have witnessed the bombing of theatres, schools and hospitals. We have seen terrible attacks and violence against civilians, even children. We have witnessed an attempt to subjugate a free and sovereign democracy, which has fought back with pride and courage to defend its independence and its dignity.
Helping Ukraine to protect itself was not only the right choice to make; it was the only choice consistent with the ideals of justice and fraternity that underpin the Charter of the United Nations and the resolutions adopted by the Assembly since the beginning of the conflict.
Italy acted without delay alongside the other States members of the European Union (EU), its NATO and Group of Seven allies and all partners that, like us, believe in a rules-based international system and multilateralism. Together, we have responded to President Zelenskyy’s request for aid because a military invasion planned months in advance and carried out on multiple fronts cannot be stopped with words alone. We have imposed unprecedented sanctions on Russia to weaken its military apparatus and to convince President Putin to take a seat at the negotiating table. We have welcomed thousands of refugees and assisted those who remain in Ukraine. We also stand ready to fund the country’s reconstruction.
The horrors of war are best answered with the warmth of solidarity. Moscow’s plan was to conquer Kyiv in a few weeks. Ukrainian soldiers thwarted that attempt and forced Russia into a longer and more difficult conflict, thanks also, in part, to our military assistance. In the past few weeks, a heroic counteroffensive has allowed Ukraine to recover thousands of square kilometres of territory, starting with Kharkiv, and forced the Russian army to retreat. The outcome of the conflict remains unpredictable, but Kyiv appears to have gained an important strategic advantage.
The sanctions we imposed on Moscow have had a disruptive effect on Russia’s war machine and on its economy. Russia is struggling to make the armaments it needs on its own, as it is finding it difficult to buy the materials required to produce them. The International Monetary Fund expects the Russian economy to contract both this year and the next by approximately 10 per cent in total, compared to the 5 per cent growth estimated before the war. The impact of those measures is likely to grow over time, partly because some will take effect only in the coming months. With a weaker economy, it will be more difficult for Russia to respond effectively to the defeats that are piling up on the battlefield.
The unity of the European Union and its allies has been instrumental in providing Ukraine with the support it needs and in imposing harsh costs on Russia. Moscow immediately tried to divide our countries by using gas as a means of blackmail.
Italy reacted promptly, diversifying its gas suppliers and accelerating the production of renewable energy. To date, we have halved our dependence on Russian gas and expect to become completely independent in 2024. On that path, we benefited from agreements made with many African countries, from Algeria to Angola to the Republic of the Congo. We want to develop green technologies together in order to place Africa squarely at the centre of the green transition. The war in Ukraine has redrawn energy geography and, with it, geopolitics. The European Union is set to look increasingly to the South and Italy can be a bridge to the southern shore of the Mediterranean and to the entire African continent.
Social cohesion is essential to maintaining a united, resolute position consistent with our values. The rising cost of energy is undermining economic recovery, limiting the purchasing power of households and damaging the productive capacity of businesses, and it could sap our country’s commitment to Ukraine.
In Italy, we have spent approximately 3.5 per cent of our gross domestic product to help businesses and citizens cope with rising inflation. We now need to do more, especially at the European level. As Italy has long argued, the European Union must impose a price cap on gas imports, which will also help us further reduce our payments to Russia. The EU must support its member States while they support Kyiv and use the strength of its institutions to shield its neighbours from Russian claims.
In many countries, the war of aggression in Ukraine has awakened or strengthened the desire for a united Europe. The Italian Government has long championed Ukraine’s bid for EU membership and strongly supports the integration of the Western Balkans, Moldova and Georgia into the European Union.
We can emerge from crises only by looking to the future with courage and ambition. Our goal is peace, and that peace must be deemed acceptable to Ukraine if it is to be lasting and sustainable. So far, Russia has not shown that it wants an end to the conflict. The referendums for independence in the Donbas constitute a further violation of international law that we firmly condemn.
Nonetheless, Italy wishes to be at the forefront of efforts to try and reach an agreement as soon as that becomes possible. We have managed to do so in the past, when we highlighted how the blockade of Black Sea ports posed a threat to global food security. The agreement on Ukrainian grain exports marked an important moment of cooperation between the parties, for which I want to thank the United Nations, Secretary- General Guterres and Tiirkiye.
It is our hope that we will be able to find other ways of cooperating, starting with the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant. Allowing a team of experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency access to the plants was a step forward. Now, it is essential that we arrive at some form of demilitarization of the area. We cannot risk a nuclear catastrophe.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has produced consequences that go far beyond Europe’s borders. Rising energy prices have hit the poorest the hardest, exacerbating poverty and inequality. Rising food prices and the scarce availability of grain and other cereals have had the hardest impact on the poorest countries. Reduced gas supplies have forced some countries to reopen coal-fired power plants or postpone their closure, albeit for a period strictly related to the emergency.
We must respond to such an attack on our peaceful coexistence with multilateralism, in a spirit of solidarity and responsibility. We must respond to the war of aggression by reaffirming the principles underpinning the General Assembly, namely, respect for human rights, international cooperation and non-belligerence.
In his address to the General Assembly in 1988, Mikhail Gorbachev noted how, in a globalized world, the use or threat of force could no longer and must no longer be an instrument of foreign policy (see A/43/ PV.72). Efforts to solve global problems, Gorbachev said, require a new scope and quality of interaction of States. Our reaction to the war in Ukraine serves to reaffirm the fact that gratuitous violence should have no place in the twenty-first century.
Italy hopes that there can be a future in which Russia returns to the principles to which it chose to subscribe in 1945. A world divided into blocs and characterized by rigid ideological demarcations and military confrontations cannot generate development or solve problems. We must maintain our individual identities while conducting international relations responsibly, legally and peacefully. That principle must apply to all the crises we face, from Ukraine to the recent clashes in the Caucasus; from the instability in Africa, the Middle East and Latin America to the tensions in the Indo-Pacific.
Despite the divisions of recent months, we have a solid foundation on which to build. Italy’s presidency of the Group of 20 (G-20) last year coincided with a moment of great cooperation among countries. It is a legacy that we must not dissipate. In that regard, I recall Rome’s readiness to host World Expo 2030 in order to continue to offer shared solutions to global problems.
At the most acute stage of the pandemic, we took action to overcome protectionism in medical supplies and ensure more vaccines for the world’s poorest regions. Through the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access Facility mechanism, we distributed more than 1.4 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines to the countries that needed them the most. We enhanced financial assistance to vulnerable States to help them respond to the economic consequences of the pandemic and we promoted the extension of the Debt Service Suspension Initiative.
Through a newfound spirit of cooperation, we intensified the fight against climate change. For the first time, all G-20 member States pledged to try to keep global warming to within 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and accepted the scientific facts behind that goal. We also agreed on a set of short- and medium-term responses to achieve that goal. The commitments that we made at the twenty-sixth Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Glasgow followed shortly thereafter.
At the G-20 Summit, we set out new financial contributions to help low-income countries transition to a more sustainable economy. We must continue to support the most vulnerable States in order to help them defend themselves against the impacts of climate change and to pursue their own transition paths. I refer here, for example, to the tragic flooding in Pakistan, where a large part of the country is under water and millions of people have been forced to leave their homes. The environmental crisis affects us all and we must all come out of it together.
Italy’s commitment to peace and international solidarity is unceasing. We are the largest contributor of Blue Helmets among European countries, and our military is deployed across five missions in the Mediterranean, Africa and Asia. We participate in the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon with the second-largest contingent.
We are very active in promoting dialogue with all countries in the wider Mediterranean. In Libya, we are committed to ensuring that the difficult process of national reconciliation receives strong support from the international community. On that journey, the United Nations remains our main point of reference.
I also want to thank United Nations institutions for the valuable humanitarian aid they provide for the management of migration in the Mediterranean. Italy is well aware that migration is a global phenomenon and must be addressed as such. We must take a responsible, humane and shared approach.
The war in Ukraine and the resulting crises have strained the cohesion of the international community, but it is precisely in that context that we need to rediscover the spirit of cooperation that has, in the past, enabled us to face similar challenges together. Our common institutions must renew themselves. Italy strongly supports the need to reform the Security Council to make it more representative, efficient and transparent.
In the coming years, Italy will continue to be a protagonist in the EU and stand close to its NATO allies, ready to listen, open to dialogue and determined to contribute to international peace and security. Those are the same principles and goals that inspire the United Nations and that we must defend urgently today.