Nauru

Allow me to congratulate Mr. Sam Kutesa on his assumption of the presidency of the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth session. Let me assure him of my delegation’s full support and cooperation as he steers our work during this session. I must also commend his predecessor, Ambassador John Ashe, for showing such capable leadership during the previous session. He led the small island developing States (SIDS) through several important milestones during his tenure, including the International Year of Small Island Developing States and the recently concluded International Conference on SIDS in Samoa. It has been said that the stars are aligned with SIDS this year. Ambassador Ashe has been our brightest beacon, and I thank him very much for that. Let me also thank another champion of the SIDS, Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon. Indeed, earlier this year, I sat in the Trusteeship Council Chamber when the Secretary-General helped us celebrate the launch of the International Year of Small Island Developing States. Showing a remarkable understanding of our unique circumstances, he said: “The International Year offers us the opportunity to celebrate the rich cultural heritage of the people of small island developing States and to honour their many contributions to our world. It is also an opportunity to highlight the various needs and challenges of this diverse coalition. Some small island developing States have enjoyed long-lasting stability. Others are in transition. Some are economically more fragile than others... Others are extremely vulnerable to the immediate effects of climate change. But all small island developing States share a common understanding. We need to set our world on a sustainable path.” The challenges of SIDS are many. One need only glance at the headlines to appreciate that they join a long list of concerns that the international community must confront today: naked brutality, pestilence, poverty and the worsening impacts of climate change, to name only a few. I understand the impulse for us to put off hard decisions to another day, prioritize some over others, or even bury our heads in the sand. But the General Assembly is and remains the pre-eminent forum for grappling with global crises, and the United Nations is our best hope for solving them. However, if we are to be successful, we must acknowledge a reality that lies beneath so many of those challenges, namely, that we live in an interconnected world and that the actions of one country or region impact the lives of people half a world away. Conflict, poverty and disease can send refugees across borders and oceans and sometimes all the way to our shores. We can no longer escape each other. As the Secretary- General also remarked, we all share the same island. Also, we must consider my country’s connection to the ocean. As for so many SIDS, the ocean is the foundation of our culture and economy, and we depend on its bounty for food and income. Yet the reckless actions of other nations have severely undermined the marine environment on which we so depend — from excessive greenhouse gas emissions that warm the planet and make the seas more and more acidic to irresponsible overfishing, the outright stealing of fish in our waters, and dangerous pollution, the effect of which we have yet to fully comprehend. All the while, some of those same countries responsible for the damage are also charged with assessing the well-being of the marine environment. How can we be confident that our interests will be protected in that effort? We, as a developing country, are constantly facing demands for greater transparency and accountability from the same actors that downplay, and sometimes even cover up, their own transgressions. Finding lasting solutions to problems such as those will require more resources and a level of cooperation that the international community has so far not countenanced. It will also require us to look at the failings in the global order that somehow prevent countries such as mine from accessing the fair economic benefits of our own resources. Nevertheless, we cannot just stand by and do nothing. We cannot and should not wait for others to decide what is best for us. For that reason, the parties to the Nauru Agreement are taking the lead in successfully managing their tuna stocks through such measures as curbing illegal fishing and sustainable harvesting. The President has wisely chosen “Delivering on and implementing a transformative post-2015 development agenda” as the theme of the general debate of the sixty-ninth session. It goes to the heart of the central task before us — not only fulfilling the long-standing promises with regard to sustainable development but also engendering a paradigm shift in the way that we achieve such development. The current piecemeal approach, where a donor’s political interests determine aid priorities, may treat symptoms for a time, but it fails to address the underlying disease. If we want our efforts to be successful over the long term, we need to build a foundation that develops global citizens and gives them the tools they need to succeed in a global world. In other words, we must move beyond capacity-building to institution-building. What is needed is long-term in-country engagement, backed by real resources, that produces durable domestic institutions run by nationals. We cannot let new and emerging issues distract or diminish work on core priorities that remain inadequately addressed. We may be experiencing our own fatigue when we again raise the issues of overfishing, climate adaptation and water treatment, but those are often the areas most in need of attention. I know that tackling all of those problems will be a tall order and may seem quite daunting, I am absolutely confident that this institution and its agencies are up to the task. We have made some progress in reducing hunger, poverty and disease. And just this week, the world watched as leaders gathered at the Climate Summit to announce the actions that their countries and corporations are planning in order to lower greenhouse gas emissions responsible for the climate crisis. The Summit provided hope that, at least in some corners, serious climate action is imminent. However, it was hard to ignore the fact that most announcements were about the greenhouse gas reductions that would occur under some future Government a decade or more in the future. What is more, SIDS, which contribute only a fraction of global emissions, have undertaken to build sustainable economies while announcing some of the most ambitious pledges to cut emissions. For example, we are working closely with the International Renewable Energy Agency, through their Lighthouses initiative, to achieve our own goal of a 50 per cent reduction in 2020. My own regional group, the Pacific SIDS, led the General Assembly to formally recognize the connection between climate change and international peace and security in 2009 and helped convince the Security Council to do the same in 2011. But, while few countries doubt the correlation between climate change and conflict today and despite graphic examples of such in the past few years alone, there is still disagreement as to the way forward. Therefore, we are still of the opinion that the Secretary- General should appoint a special representative on climate and security to analyse the projected security impacts of the crisis. In addition, the Secretary-General should lead a joint task force of all relevant organs and specialized agencies to assess the capacity of the United Nations system to respond. That is the least we can do as an international body to prepare for one of the biggest challenges of our generation. If the Security Council is to remain relevant, it must be adaptive enough to meet the latest threats, and climate change is a clear and present danger that we ignore at our own peril. The Security Council must also reflect new geopolitical realities by becoming more representative and inclusive. It is for that reason that Nauru supports the reform of the Security Council by enlarging its permanent and non-permanent categories and making its working methods more efficient. New members should be more geographically diverse, but they must also be willing to broaden their vision beyond a narrow focus on domestic interests to include a commitment to the common good of all Member States. Similarly, the United Nations should ensure that all citizens of the world have the opportunity to participate in its activities. It must work for the 10,000 people in Nauru and other small countries, and it must not continue to ignore the 24 million people in Taiwan, who time and again have demonstrated a commitment to peace and regional cooperation. Nauru is pleased to note that, with solid international support and the cross-Strait rapprochement, the Republic of China has increased its meaningful participation in United Nations specialized agencies and mechanisms. We continue to encourage the positive interaction between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait in the international arena. Furthermore, I would like to recognize the contributions that Taiwan has made to help my country make progress towards its national sustainable development strategy. I take the opportunity to also express my country’s deep appreciation to our friends and partners who continue to support our sustainable development priorities, including Australia, Russia, New Zealand, the European Union, Cuba, Israel and Turkey, to mention a few. The world is rapidly changing, and the new realities have strained the ability of the United Nations to respond adequately. Long-term solutions will require a new commitment to providing adequate means of implementation. On climate change alone, we are far from the goal of providing $100 billion a year by 2020 to help nations adapt to climate impacts that are now unavoidable and to build sources of clean energy, to say nothing of the 0.7 per cent gross domestic product goal for development aid. I know that we, as an international community, face numerous crises on many fronts and that much is being asked of us. But I strongly believe that it is in times like these that solutions to even the most intractable problems emerge from the human spirit. It is in times like these that light emerges from darkness; hope from despair. The small island developing States have laid out a vision to help us reach our full potential. I invite our partners to invest in our peoples, and we will build a better and more secure world. The United Nations remains our best hope for people everywhere to live in peace and prosperity. My faith in it has never been stronger. God bless the Republic of Nauru and God bless the United Nations.