I bring to the
Assembly fraternal greetings and best wishes from
Mr. Ernest Bai Koroma, President of the Republic of
Sierra Leone, and his beleaguered people. President
Koroma deeply regrets that, for obvious reasons, he is
unable to participate in the sixty-ninth session of the
General Assembly. He has, however, instructed me to
deliver to the Assembly this message from him:
“I congratulate the President on being elected
to conduct the affairs of the sixty-ninth session of
the Assembly and assure him of the support and
cooperation of my country, Sierra Leone, during
his tenure. To his predecessor, Ambassador John
Ashe of Antigua and Barbuda, let me, on behalf
of my Government and people, express our
appreciation for his astute leadership and skill in
smoothly directing the work of the past session of
the General Assembly.
“My sincere thanks and appreciation go to
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for his constructive
and dynamic leadership of the Organization. Sierra
Leone deeply appreciates his forward-looking and
laudable initiatives on the issues of sustainable
energy and climate change, among others. In
particular, I appreciate his robust response to the
Ebola epidemic that is causing so much havoc in
our lives and threatening our dignity and our very
existence. We will continue to support those highly
ambitious and commendable initiatives for a better
and safer world.
“Sierra Leone commends the President on
the choice, appropriateness and sense of urgency
of the theme of the sixty-ninth session of the
General Assembly, and we join him in calling
for a structured dialogue, strengthened global
partnership and enhanced cooperation for its
achievement. Sierra Leone wishes to reiterate the
need to generate the required global political will
to address unfinished business in the context of
the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by
focusing on implementation gaps and new and
emerging challenges. As Chair of the small Group
of Seven Plus States, Sierra Leone reaffirms the
call of this group of fragile and post-conflict States
for the support of goal 16 of the outcome document
of the Open Working Group on Sustainable
Development Goals. Goal 16 is one of 17 priorities
of the post-2015 development agenda and envisages
promoting peaceful and inclusive institutions as a
stand-alone aim.
“My country is battling one of the biggest life-or-
death challenges facing the global community. As
I stated in my address to the Secretary-General’s
high-level meeting on response to the Ebola virus
disease outbreak, Ebola is unlike previous threats,
not because something similar has never occurred
before, but because the Ebola outbreak has mutated
into a phenomenon for which my country, my
region and the global community were grossly ill-
prepared. Isolated communities are becoming less
frequent in our globalized world. Mutating viral
diseases like Ebola can no longer be neatly isolated
simply by sealing off a country in a corner of the
world. The Ebola outbreak in our region provides
the first challenge to infrastructure, human capital
and public health and surveillance systems that
are too weak to deal with the faster occurrences
of animal-to-human, and human-to-human
transmissions of highly contagious diseases that
have been made possible by quicker transportation,
increasing urbanization and dense networks of
people moving between rural and urban areas and
across borders.
“We have been slow to meet this new challenge
because no one recognized that this confluence of
trends could emerge with such virulence in West
Africa. Our international partners were slow to
recognize the threat for what it was, and when
recognition did come, it was accompanied by a
spontaneous reaction of fear and panic that led to
the closure of borders and the imposition of travel
restrictions to and from Sierra Leone and our
subregion.
“This is the very first time Ebola has come to
our region and to my country, Sierra Leone. We
did not bring it on ourselves. We are rebuilding
our infrastructure, implementing policies that
were increasing our growth rates, improving our
health-care and literacy indicators, enhancing
our peace, and strengthening our democracy.
We are contributing troops to the United Nations
peacekeeping operations in other lands, as our share
of the peace dividend. The world was lauding us for
doing so many things right, for being a symbol of
fast-paced recovery from a decade-long devastating
civil conflict, for promoting and protecting human
rights, and for advancing along an impressive path
of socioeconomic reconstruction. We were gearing
up our health-care system to fight the known
ailments of our land, such as malaria, maternal
and infant mortality, Lassa fever, tuberculosis
and typhoid, when Ebola struck. Based on the
knowledge we had, based on the advice we were
given by our international partners, we mobilized
to meet this unfamiliar threat. But the staff,
equipment, medicines and systems we had were
inadequate, and this slowed our effective response.
“Several months down the road, the
international community has finally come around
to the view that the Ebola outbreak is a challenge
for everyone, and that, while Sierra Leone and its
sister republics are at the front line of this fight,
the heavy aerial and ground support of the world
are required to defeat the outbreak, for Ebola is
in many ways worse than terrorism. As a country,
we have taken extraordinary measures, including
declaring a state of emergency and shutting down
the country for three days to get health educators
into every household in the country. Today, most of
our people know that Ebola may present with the
same signs as malaria, typhoid, diarrhoea and other
infectious diseases, but that it is far more deadly,
and that there is a need to modify behaviour in
order to counter its transmission.
“Socioeconomic disruptions are already being
felt. We are no longer able to engage in our cultural
practices, such as shaking hands when we gladly
receive each other, or hold religious and communal
burial ceremonies. Our people live in fear and
cannot understand the nature of a disease that
claims lives and prevents family members from
burying their loved ones.
“The indeterminate suspension of several
ongoing development projects, and the disruption
to farming, mining, manufacturing, construction,
tourism, trading and public transportation, following
the outbreak of Ebola, are now undermining the
growth and human development prospects of the
country. The International Monetary Fund has
estimated that our gross domestic product will
drop by 3.3 per cent in 2014 from 11.3 per cent to
8 per cent. Ebola has placed a stranglehold on the
socioeconomic prospects of the country, and, in
addition, we risk reversing the hard gains achieved
in peacebuilding.
“We salute the great efforts of countries, as
well as international and national organizations,
that have committed resources to our common
fight. We welcome the adoption of the landmark
Security Council resolution 2177 (2014) and its
General Assembly counterpart, resolution 69/1,
both of which recognize the Ebola outbreak as a
threat to international peace and security. We
also salute the Secretary-General for his initiative
in establishing the first-ever United Nations
emergency health mission, the United Nations
Mission for Ebola Emergency Response, to lead
a concerted and coordinated effort to contain and
defeat this scourge within the subregion.
“We know that to defeat the disease and
prevent future outbreaks anywhere in the world, we
must improve our capacities for quicker response.
In Sierra Leone, this calls for faster deployment of
staff, medicines and equipment at the global and
national levels. Globally, a faster response means
quickening the pace of resource mobilization
and disbursements, as well as the development of
vaccines and curative medicines. Nationally, our
effort must rapidly translate into effective urban
and rural community response initiatives. Any
break in this chain of fast response makes the
challenge more difficult to meet, and not meeting
the challenge means more deaths in our country and
the increased possibility that the virus will mutate
and spread to areas from which it is currently
absent.
“The world needs a faster global response
infrastructure to deal with this new trend that
is today manifesting itself in the West African
nations of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, but to
which no country can be immune. Ebola is winning
the race against us. To make an impactful start in
reversing this trend, we must have more treatment
beds than there are Ebola cases. Only when the
number of available beds surpasses the number of
cases can we say that Ebola has been brought under
control. This is a fight for all of us. We must prove
that humankind is equal to overcoming this new
challenge to our collective existence.
“We also believe that it is high time for this
Assembly to make its voice heard regarding the
flight bans and cancellations that have accompanied
the deadly Ebola outbreak. The World Health
Organization and many others have advised against
imposing blanket flight bans. We therefore urge
Member States to re-examine their policies of
isolating and stigmatizing Ebola-affected countries
and their respective citizens. The world is too
globalized for policies that shun engagement with a
democratic nation. The United Nations was founded
on a mandate to confront human insecurity, not
shun it. Moreover, this Organization was founded
on the principle of doing better than before. We
strongly urge loyalty to the founding ideals of our
global Organization.
“Despite the daunting challenge facing us as
a nation and subregion, Sierra Leone will remain
a trusted and strategic partner in the global effort
to eradicate poverty and achieve sustainable
peace, stability and development. My Government
is committed to forging closer bonds with all
countries, especially within the context of the New
Deal for Engagement in Fragile States.
“As Coordinator of the African Union
Committee of Ten Heads of State on the Reform of
the United Nations, we will continue to advance the
African Common Position on the reform process of
the United Nations by reaching out and engaging
with other interest groups in a bid to reach a common
understanding of how to obtain a strong, inclusive,
united, transparent and accountable Security
Council. While the world now acknowledges the
historical injustice represented by the fact that
Africa is the only continent not represented in
the permanent category of Council membership
and, at the same time, is underrepresented in the
non-permanent category, it is about time for this
Organization to take the necessary bold steps to put
into practice our reaffirmation of the equal rights
of nations, large and small. Indeed, as we gear up
to celebrate 70 memorable years of the existence
of the United Nations, it is an appropriate time
for the Organization to promote the principle of
the sovereign equality of all its Members and to
ensure for all the rights and benefits resulting from
membership.
“We are encouraged by the progress made in
strengthening peace and democracy within member
countries of the Mano River Union, and we shall
continue to support initiatives for the sustenance
and growth of democratic order, peace and security
in the subregion. We will continue to adhere to
the Economic Community of West African States
(ECOWAS) protocols for peace, democracy and
stability and will sustain our support for the
building of the ECOWAS logistical depot in Sierra
Leone. We firmly support the African Union
rapid intervention initiative for peacekeeping and
peace-support operations. We have also ratified
the Arms Trade Treaty and the Convention against
Transnational Organized Crime and the Protocols
thereto. We are currently working to incorporate
them into our domestic law.
“My Government will continue to contribute
troops and support international peacekeeping
operations for international peace and security, and
we will accordingly seek capacity-building and
other support in such laudable ventures. We are,
however, dismayed by the current trend of events
in South Sudan, the Central African Republic, the
Gaza Strip, Syria, Ukraine, Iraq and other parts of
the world that are still in conflict. We will commit
Sierra Leone to the global search for common
agreement on the root causes of those conflicts
and encourage dialogue to work out resolutions
that are peaceful and sustainable. We support the
two independent States solution in the Israeli-
Palestinian conflict.
“Sierra Leone condemns any act of terrorism
in all its forms and manifestations in the world
in general and in Africa in particular. Terrorism
is a common enemy to international peace and
security. Sierra Leone prides itself on its high level
of religious tolerance, and we believe that people of
all religions and ethnic backgrounds must be able
to coexist in peace and harmony everywhere in the
world. We likewise view acts of drug trafficking,
human trafficking, smuggling of migrants,
marine piracy, cybercrime, abductions and all
other organized or unorganized transnational
criminal activities as serious threats to global
peace, stability and development. My Government
will strengthen national capacities and contribute
through international cooperation to preventing
and combating those crimes.
“As a post-conflict country, we are aware
that sexual violence in conflict is one of the
greatest and most persistent injustices in the world
today. We are therefore supportive of the United
Kingdom’s Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative
and the subsequent Declaration of Commitment to
End Sexual Violence in Conflict. We support the
work of the Office of the Special Representative
of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence
in Conflict. We also fully support the United
Kingdom Government’s leadership in promoting
global advocacy against the use of children in
armed conflicts.
“We are following the unfolding developments at
the International Criminal Court and are supportive
of the efforts to ensure judicial accountability in
ways that are respectful of Africa’s concerns for
the ability of its statesmen and stateswomen to
steer the countries of the continent towards greater
security, reconciliation, peace and development.
“My Government will continue to support
the work of the Human Rights Council. We are
committed to the moratorium on the death penalty
and have gone a step further in the process of
commuting capital offences to life imprisonment in
our statute books.
“In conclusion, while applauding the
international community for supporting our
aspirations, we wish to remind the world that
fighting the Ebola virus disease in West Africa
is a matter of life and death for the whole of
humankind. The World Health Organization
finally got it right when it declared the outbreak
as a global health emergency, but an emergency
requires a response faster than what is currently
obtaining. We can defeat Ebola and, as already
noted by experts, future outbreaks of diseases
of that nature anywhere in the world can also be
defeated by quickening the pace of response. Our
understanding of that unprecedented outbreak is
better now than at the beginning, and our response
has improved accordingly. While our capacities are
getting better coordinated, there is still room for
strengthening those capacities to ensure effective
national ownership and leadership of all response
mechanisms. Undoubtedly, we can do better than
what obtained at the beginning of the outbreak, and
we must do all we can to end such a grave threat
to our collective survival. We will also continue
our engagement with all stakeholders to build our
public health system beyond Ebola.
“On the occasion of the sixty-ninth session of
the General Assembly, let me reiterate our deepest
condolences to the families and relatives of all our
brave men, women and children who have lost their
lives to the Ebola virus disease. May the Father
most high receive their souls and the souls of all
faithful departed into his merciful hands.”