Fiji

My delegation wishes to associate itself with the compliments paid to you, Mr. President, on your election to your high office, and we pledge to you our continued co operation. We would also like to acknowledge with satisfaction the outstanding leadership of your predecessor in office. I would like to place on record my Government's satisfaction with the excellent work being done by the Secretary General during his first year in office. We wish to assure him of our continued support. We extend to him our compliments and endorse his forthright and incisive views on the major issues confronting this planet and on the role of the United Nations in the efforts to resolve the problems that we share as a result of our inseparable humanity. He has highlighted not only the problems, but the structural weaknesses of the Organization in tackling those problems. In our view, the United Nations must, as a matter of urgency, address both dimensions if all of humanity is to have even a chance. In the Secretary General's report on the work of the Organization he alluded to the failure of the collective security system of the League of Nations. It will be recalled that concurrently with the failure of the League of Nations the world suffered an unprecedented economic depression which in many ways contributed to the upheaval of the Second World War. It has been noted that the only thing we learn from history is that we do not learn from history. How true that is. The present world political and economic situation, which I need not reiterate before the Assembly, and the inability of the United Nations to deal effectively with issues pertaining thereto, bear an unnerving resemblance to the events that ushered in the Second World War. While my country, Fiji, in the peaceful South Pacific Ocean, is thousands of miles away from the Middle East, our commitment to world peace led to our direct involvement in United Nations efforts to bring peace and stability to the area. Of particular concern to my Government has been the recent resurgence of war in the unfortunate country of Lebanon. The resultant massacres of Palestinian men, women and children is a matter to be deplored by all. My Government has already condemned all those that were directly or indirectly involved in the killings. The problem of Lebanon is part of the overall problem of the Middle East J which has defied solution for more than three decades. In the mean time, new elements have been injected into the conflict and this has made peace in the area even more elusive. My delegation continues to support the principles set forth in Security Council resolutions 242 (1967) and 338 (1973) as a basis for peace in the region. It is also imperative that the aspirations of the Palestinian people to a homeland be realized, and that the rights of all States, including that of Israel, to live within recognized boundaries be acknowledged. My country has always advocated the peaceful resolution of all disputes through dialogue and negotiations. It was in this spirit that my Government agreed to contribute peace keeping forces to UNIFIL in 1978. In the same spirit, Fiji decided to contribute troops to the multinational forces and observers last year in order to further the peace agreement between Egypt and Israel that led to the return of the Sinai. The cost of the contribution to UNIFIL has been particularly burdensome for a small country such as ours. For the past four years our ability to maintain our troops in Lebanon has been seriously undermined by the accumulated arrears of reimbursements, which amount to millions of dollars. It is our earnest hope that all Member States will meet their obligations and pay the assessed contributions promptly so that reimbursements at the agreed levels can be made to participants in UNIFIL without delay. No one can deny that UNIFIL has proved its usefulness, but for peace keeping forces to be effective it is essential that they have both a clear mandate and the co operation, respect and support of all Member States and, more particularly, of the immediate parties to the disputes. This, regrettably, has not always been the case in Lebanon. The situation in the Asian region has remained the same. Foreign armed intervention and occupation continue in Afghanistan and Kampuchea. In both cases the majority of United Nations Members have taken an unequivocal stand, to which we subscribe. This international concern will continue until the foreign forces are unconditionally withdrawn. Only then will the freedom of their people and the sovereignty and territorial integrity of those countries be restored. With respect to Kampuchea, the recent initiatives that have brought the resistance groups into a coalition provide a better basis for a negotiated and peaceful solution of the problem in that country. We hope that there will be a more positive response to this important development. The vexed question of the peaceful reunification of Korea remains with us. However, we regard the recent proposal by South Korea as an important step towards reconciliation. It is our hope that a unified Korea will soon become a reality. In the field of disarmament very little has been achieved. All we hear of are new initiatives or the breakdown of talks. The recent special session of the General Assembly on disarmament was no exception. If anything, the arms race has been escalated. The goal is no longer to establish deterrent forces, but rather, as one of the super Powers has stated recently from this rostrum, to achieve armed superiority and maintain it. We must pause to think of the logical consequences of such a course and where the super Powers are leading us all. There appears to be no limit to man's quest for self destruction. It is more urgent than ever that, as a first step, the international community agree to the total prohibition of nuclear weapon testing. Fiji supports this proposal, as well as efforts to conclude a comprehensive test ban treaty. In this regard, it urges the resumption of the trilateral talks. We in the South Pacific find ourselves a direct victim of the arms race. One major Power continues its nuclear testing in the Pacific, in total disregard of the protests of the peoples and the Governments in the region. These tests, conducted by France on small atolls, pose great hazards to the marine environment in the region. No one can say with certainty what the effect of those tests may be in the future. Last August the heads of Governments of the South Pacific countries, who met in Rotorua, New Zealand, once again condemned those tests and urged their immediate cessation. They also expressed their opposition to the dumping of nuclear wastes in the Pacific. We hope that those calls will not go unheeded. Since its inception the Organization has played an important role in the field of decolonization. As a member of the Special Committee on the Situation with regard to the Implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples over the past 12 years, Fiji has seen the decolonization process evolve further. Apart from Namibia, the African continent is liberated. But there are still other dependent Territories in other parts of the world. Some of these are in the Pacific, and we note with interest that this process of evolution is beginning to take place in Territories such as New Caledonia. In this connection the leaders of the countries of the South Pacific Forum find reassuring the determination of the French Government to introduce important reforms in that Territory Y these reforms are followed through, they should eventually lead to self determination and independence with the full participation of its indigenous population. We welcome this important development. After years of arduous negotiation, the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea adopted in April this year a comprehensive Convention dealing with all uses of the sea. It is a pity that, because of a few delegations, this important milestone in recent history could not be reached by consensus. But this cannot detract from the significance of the achievement, given the vastness, importance and complexity of the subject matter, the conflicting interests of States and the difficulty of working out an international regime for the sea bed beyond national jurisdiction capable of equitably balancing the interests of developed and developing countries. For Fiji and similar small island countries the Convention consolidates their inherent rights to the resources in their surrounding seas. It was therefore not surprising that the heads of Government of the South Pacific countries, at a recent meeting, unanimously welcomed the adoption of the Convention and urged all States to sign and ratify it. Indeed, my Prime Minister observed that it was an historic act and a milestone in international negotiations. Fiji, which participated actively in the negotiations, looks forward to signing the Final Act in Jamaica this year. The world economy is beset by severe problems. The industrialized countries are facing continuing recession and heavy unemployment. Enough interest rates have tended to decline recently, they have been at unprecedentedly high levels in the past two years. Commodity prices are at their lowest levels and the volume of international trade has virtually ceased to grow. Global interdependence is such that the prosperity of the developing countries is dependent on the performance of the industrialized countries. The recession in the industrialized countries, therefore, has a profound impact on the economies of the developing countries. Many developing countries which are already struggling with large debt repayments have had their problems exacerbated by high interest payments, adverse trends in the terms of trade and depressed export volumes. The conditions of weak demand and high unemployment in the industrialized countries have led to an increasing tendency towards protectionism. In particular, there has been an expanding commitment in developed countries to protect agriculture through high tariffs, variable import levies or variable export subsidies. As a result, there is hardly a major agricultural product in which developed countries compete with developing countries for which the world market is not undermined or distorted by subsidized exports or concessional sales from surplus stocks of developed countries. In some cases, as a consequence of rising agricultural protection, countries which were once large importers have become large subsidized exporters. International commodity agreements are rendered useless by large scale dumping. A case in point is that of sugar. In 1981, for instance, the European Economic Community became the world's second largest exporter of sugar, after Cuba. Ironically, it is the developing countries, which cannot afford large scale competitive subsidization of major exports, that are forced to adjust In the present world economic climate the plight of the small island countries such as Fiji is a difficult one. They are vulnerable. Their economies are highly susceptible to external economic influences beyond their control. Fiji's expert base is Harrow, with sugar and tourism the two major foreign exchange earners, accounting for the major part of total foreign exchange receipts. The unpredictable and harsh impact of external developments has brought a number of small island economies face to face with precarious financial situations. Their efforts to develop and diversify their economies have been dealt severe blows by adverse world economic developments, such as the oil crisis, high rates of interest, protectionism and drying pools of multilateral and bilateral loans. The smallness of island economics and their high dependence on international trade leave these countries limited policy options for solving the problems of low income,, high unemployment and balance of payments deficits. In a period when global arrangements Car trade liberalization have not made progress, my Government finds at least two limited arrangements of particular interest, the first being the Lome Convention between the African, Caribbean and Pacific States and the European Community, and the second the South Pacific Regional Trade and Co operation Agreement between the small island countries in the South Pacific and Australia and New Zealand. The Lome Convention also guarantees access to part of our vital sugar exports into the European Community. Under SPARTEC A, certain products from the island countries enjoy preferential access to Australian and New Zealand markets. Both these arrangements have provided considerable economic benefits to the developing countries concerned and are examples of the kind of schemes required under the North South economic dialogue. As a member of the Governing Council of UNDP, Fiji is concerned about the general decline in the resources available to UNDP. The numerous projects supported by UNDP in many developing countries and the increasing number of requests regularly made for such assistance amply demonstrate the significant role being played by UNDP. It is to be hoped that Member States, both donors and recipients, will make extra efforts to build up the resources of UNDP so that it can meet the demands on it. These and many other issues of international concern, on which previous speakers have addressed the Assembly so eloquently, have become the stumbling blocks in the efforts to achieve a peaceful and secure world. They have to be resolved, and this world body cannot abdicate this responsibility. Like others, my delegation knows only too well the magnitude of this responsibility. The task before the United Nations in ensuring peace and security in the world and in promoting development is not an easy one. We represent an organization in which diversity is the norm rather than the exception. However, many of the achievements that we as an organization have registered and hope to continue to register have been and remain possible only through a commonality of purpose, accommodation of differences and understanding. The issues before us at this session of the General Assembly reflect this diversity and call for much greater understanding than has been demonstrated in the past. I wish to conclude my statement by drawing to the attention of the international community the plight of the very small communities micro States, as they are called most of which are islands. I do not pretend to be a spokesman for them, but it is clear that their special needs are not being adequately addressed and that so far as the United Nations is concerned such countries, including my own, appear to be nobody's baby. The economic situation to which I referred earlier, which is so well known to representatives, bears particularly harshly on small, scattered communities. Their fragile economies are often tied to a single crop and they are susceptible to natural disasters. These are the harsh realities of their daily existence. We experience major disadvantages as we try to modernize, and find ourselves caught in vicious circles in our interaction with larger, more powerful countries. For example, it is not relevant to use per capita income as an index of our status. Its use inevitably denies us access to concessionary finance with which to advance our development. Those of us that make a little headway through our own efforts appear to be penalized for doing so. It is as if whenever we think we are making ends meet someone moves the ends. There is no point in preaching to us that we should pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps when , those who give that advice keep standing on our hands. Yet let us not abandon hope. Huxley's Brave New World may not have anticipated a world in which islands come closer to center stage, but that world is not far off. For the first time in human history, small States are finding themselves expanded almost overnight as their jurisdiction encompasses millions of square miles of ocean. How to utilize that space, how to explore and exploit it to improve the lives of our people and, indeed, all mankind, poses a challenge that we cannot face alone. No longer will the development models of the 1930s and 1960s, based on large land masses, as inAfrica, Asia or Latin America, distract or delude us. I do not imply that islands will soon be the inheritors of untold wealth or that all our problems will be overcome. My point is that the day is dawning when a new order of importance must be attached to us, our needs and our potentials, for in that process interdependence itself will be made more manifest and achieve a real meaning beyond today's fashionable rhetoric.