I am delivering this
statement on behalf of His Excellency Mr. Abdulla
Shahid, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Maldives,
who, unfortunately, had to cancel his trip to New York
at the last minute owing to various pressing
engagements at home.
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Permit me to begin by expressing my delegation’s
warmest congratulations to Mr. Miguel d’Escoto
Brockmann on his election to preside over the General
Assembly at its sixty-third session. I assure him of the
full support and cooperation of my delegation in his
work. I should also like to take this opportunity to
express our profound appreciation to his predecessor,
Mr. Srgjan Kerim, for the exemplary manner in which
he guided the work of the Assembly at its sixty-second
session. In addition, I should like to offer my
delegation’s heartfelt gratitude to Secretary-General
Ban Ki-moon for his inspiring leadership and
dedication in promoting the noble principles and ideals
of this Organization.
Four years ago, the people of the Maldives
embarked on a comprehensive reform programme
aimed at strengthening and modernizing democratic
governance in the country. Within that short period of
time, unprecedented reforms have been adopted and
the political landscape of the country has been
completely transformed.
A new Constitution that fully guarantees the civil
liberties and fundamental freedoms of our people was
adopted on 7 August 2008. To safeguard the
foundations of democracy on our islands, several
oversight bodies — a National Human Rights
Commission that complies with the Paris Principles, a
Judicial Service Commission and an independent
Elections Commission — have been established and
are now operational. Significant progress is also being
made in reforming and restructuring the legal and
judicial system of the country to align it with
internationally accepted norms and standards.
In accordance with the new Constitution, the
Maldives will hold its first multiparty presidential
election early next week. Parliamentary elections will
be held before the end of February and local municipal
elections will be completed by July next year.
Those gains were made with the help of the
international community, particularly the Commonwealth,
the European Union and the United Nations. I thank them
for their invaluable support, encouragement and
assistance in implementing the reform programme. My
Government is also extremely grateful to those
organizations for accepting our request for election
monitoring and assistance in the electoral process. We
are firm in our resolve that the elections shall be held
in a free and fair manner in full conformity with
internationally recognized standards and best practice.
When the Maldives joined the United Nations in
1965, we were one of the smallest and poorest States
Members of this Organization. We lacked even the
most basic political, legal and economic infrastructure
and institutions necessary for self-governance. Our
ability to provide for the welfare of our people was
extremely limited. The economy was based largely on
subsistence fishery, and the health and education
sectors were severely underdeveloped. However, since
then, the Maldives has achieved remarkable levels of
socio-economic progress. Thirty years of strong and
unwavering political leadership, complemented by the
hard work of our people and the generous assistance of
our development partners, have enabled the country
successfully to pursue a people-centred path of
sustainable development, based on social equity and
justice.
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are
now fully incorporated into our national development
priorities, and I am happy to note that we are among
those countries that are on track to achieve most of the
MDGs by 2015. We believe that the ongoing political,
legal and human rights reform agenda will further
strengthen our progress and propel us to new heights of
socio-economic development, with the support of our
partners.
As a result of our rapid development progress,
four years ago the Assembly decided to graduate the
Maldives from the list of least developed countries.
The Maldives is also being hailed by the international
community as a major success story of the multilateral
development assistance framework.
And yet those hard-won achievements will be
rendered meaningless if MDG 7 — environmental
sustainability — cannot be guaranteed. It is now
accepted beyond any doubt that climate change poses
the most immediate and far-reaching threat to human
security, directly compromising the most fundamental
rights, including the right to self-determination and the
right to life itself, for millions of people around the
world.
From the highest Himalayan peaks to the low-
lying coastal areas and small islands a metre or so
above sea level, global warming and changing weather
patterns are undermining the lives and livelihoods of
millions of people around the planet, with the poor
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being especially vulnerable. The recent hurricanes that
left such a trail of destruction across the Caribbean
once again brought into sharp relief the acute
vulnerabilities of small island States, such as the
Maldives, to global warming and climate change.
For the Maldives, climate change is not a distant
possibility. It is happening now and is a reality that we
are experiencing on a daily basis. The continuing
degradation of the global environment is not only
undermining our development process, but also
seriously threatening the very survival of our people
and the existence of our tiny country.
We are all aware of the grim predictions in the
fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change. If those predictions were to
come true, the Maldives and many other small island
developing States and low-lying coastal areas would
cease to exist within a relatively short period of time.
Hence, the Maldives and many other small island
developing States do not have the luxury of hesitation
and inaction, nor can we afford to pick and choose
where and when that important issue needs to be
addressed. For us, it is not solely a development issue,
but also a moral, ethical, political, legal and human
rights issue, as well as a grave security issue.
That is why the President of the Maldives took
the initiative in 1987 to raise that issue before the
Assembly. That is also why the Maldives participated
in the Security Council debate on the issue last year,
and why the Maldives decided to raise the issue before
the Human Rights Council in 2008.
The inverse relationship between responsibility
for climate change and vulnerability to its
consequences is often overlooked. The Maldives and
other small island developing States contribute the
least to global warming, and yet their development
and, indeed, their very existence are fundamentally
threatened by global warming and its consequences.
Addressing the injustices of climate change is
therefore the moral and ethical responsibility of the
entire international community. It is time that we put
people back in the climate change debate. We believe
that a comprehensive rights-based approach to
sustainable and just development, anchored in the
concept of common but differentiated responsibility, is
now an imperative.
In that regard, we are happy that, at the initiative
of the Maldives and 80 other like-minded countries, the
United Nations Human Rights Council for the first
time, earlier this year, recognized the link between
human rights and climate change. The Council will
formally debate the issue at its tenth session in March
2009, and we hope that due consideration will be given
to the outcome of the debate by our colleagues in the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change as they work to ensure an effective and
equitable successor to the Kyoto Protocol.
The Maldives is encouraged by the renewed
international impetus towards a more sustained and
robust approach to achieving the MDGs. Indeed, the
high-level event on the MDGs held last week clearly
illustrates the collective commitment and interest of
the international community to work towards achieving
those Goals. The interrelationship between climate
change, food security and the attainment of the MDGs
cannot be overemphasized. It is now believed that the
global food and energy crisis will drive more than
100 million more people into poverty.
While short-term measures may ease the
immediate pressures, we believe that a sustainable
solution to the problem lies in a fair and equitable
trading regime and a shared vision of partnership and
cooperation. The early and successful completion of
the Doha Development Round and the successful
outcome of the post-Bali negotiations, as well as the
Follow-up International Conference on Financing for
Development to be held in Qatar at the end of this year
will prove critical in that regard.
As a country that depends on importing most of
its food and all of its energy resources, the Maldives is
extremely concerned about the rise in global food and
energy prices. Although the situation in the Maldives at
present is relatively stable, the potential of a severe
blow to our economy is alarmingly high. The
Government is fully aware of the risks involved and is
taking all necessary precautionary measures to ensure
that the crisis does not adversely affect the daily lives
and well-being of our people.
Organized crime and terrorism are continuing to
threaten the maintenance of international peace and
security. The recent bombings in India and Pakistan are
yet another tragic reminder of the evil and insidious
nature of terrorism. It is therefore important for the
international community to ensure that the war against
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terrorism remains a main priority on the international
agenda.
The continued scourge of terrorism is particularly
alarming when seen in the context of the spread of
nuclear arms and other weapons of mass destruction.
The threat of a terrorist organization gaining access to
such weapons is extremely alarming.
I am happy to note that the Maldives is now party
to almost all the international conventions on counter-
terrorism. Despite its limited resource and expertise,
the Maldives has been actively working towards
implementing its various regional and multilateral
obligations under the international counter-terrorism
regime. I would therefore like to take this opportunity
to reiterate our commitment to combating global
terrorism and to Security Council resolutions 1373
(2001) and 1540 (2004) in particular.
A permanent and lasting resolution to the
question of Palestine remains elusive. The Maldives
reiterates its support for the right of the Palestinian
people to self-determination and to an independent and
sovereign homeland. We believe that the two-State
solution remains the only viable option and needs to be
pursued with greater vigour and vitality.
The United Nations in the twenty-first century
must have the ability to take on emerging challenges in
an expeditious and efficient manner. While we applaud
the present efforts to reform and revitalize the
Organization, we believe that such reforms cannot be
successfully achieved without the much-anticipated
reform of the Security Council. In that regard, we are
happy that the Assembly has decided to proceed to
intergovernmental negotiations in early 2009. We look
forward to participating in those negotiations.
Despite the criticisms levelled against the United
Nations, my country remains convinced that the
Organization is the most potent and credible universal
institution today. For the past six decades, the United
Nations has been a beacon of hope for peoples around
the world. Its universal character and the
multilateralism that it embodies hold true to the ideals
and virtues upon which it was founded and, without a
doubt, provide the only viable framework for solving
the world’s great challenges, including climate change,
sustainable development, human rights and global
terrorism.
I therefore reaffirm the Maldives’ commitment to
the principles enshrined in the United Nations Charter.
I offer our full support to the United Nations in its
resolute efforts to maintain international peace and
security and to work towards the betterment of all
humanity.