It is a great honour for
me to stand once again before the Assembly — the
last time I shall do so in my two terms as President of
Indonesia. I could not agree more with the theme chosen
for this session, “Delivering on and implementing a
transformative post-2015 development agenda”, which
is very much in line with the work of the High-level
Panel I have been privileged to co-chair.
For the past 15 years, the international community
has been working on a grand and ambitious project
for humankind, the Millennium Development Goals
(MDGs). Our hard work over the years has produced
achievements that include breakthroughs in combating
poverty, increasing school enrolment and improving
public health. Those achievements are encouraging and,
in some instances, inspiring. But humankind as a whole
has not achieved all the MDG targets. The successes
have been uneven, differing between regions, within
regions and even within countries. We have come a
long way, yet we still have a long way to go.
For those who have made it, as well as for those
who have yet to make it, I have learned one great lesson,
which is that the most important driver of change
lies in governance — not just good governance, but
smart governance. Smart governance usually involves
innovative leadership and active public participation.
Without at least those two elements, all the hard work
we put in will not produce the desired results. And with
smart governance, nations can exceed their potential
and leapfrog over others ahead of them. In Indonesia we
have managed to increase our national per capita income
by 400 per cent within just one decade, something that
was beyond our wildest imagination.
The quest to achieve the MDGs over the past
15 years has also reinforced the need for a more robust
global partnership. There has certainly been much
activity. But somehow, our efforts in the World Trade
Organization, on the post-Kyoto climate, on reforming
the global financial architecture and the United Nations
and in many other areas have proved painfully slow.
As we set forth a new global agenda for development,
I believe we can draw on those years of trial and error to
become more acutely aware of the promises and pitfalls
of development, and of what we want and what we do
not want. We do not want development that measures
progress in terms of material possessions alone and
ends up dehumanizing and marginalizing our citizens.
What we want is sustainable development with equity.
Yet the importance of our work lies beyond the
issue of development, since we are now also confronted
with yet another major problem. We are witnessing a
worrying deterioration in the relations between the
major Powers. None of us, certainly not the United
Nations, can afford to bury our heads in the sand about
that grim development.
It is especially worrying, given that for more than
two decades after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the world
actually witnessed a series of promising events. Most
fundamental was the fact that improved relations among
the major Powers created ample space for new strategic
and economic opportunities. Global trade totals have
reached $23 trillion, an almost six-fold expansion since
the year after the Cold War ended in 1990. The fastest
growth — one and a half times as fast as during the
preceding two decades — was from 2000 to 2013, the
period that coincided with our work on the MDGs. The
value of global investments reached almost $1.5 trillion
in 2013 for a near seven-fold increase since 1990.
In South-East Asia, that positive geopolitical
development has allowed us to develop stronger
cooperation and to develop the region’s architecture.
It led to the establishment of the East Asia Summit, a
vision for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) community, a progressive ASEAN Charter,
a more active ASEAN Regional Forum and other
institutions. And Indonesia has also been able to develop
strategic partnerships with all the major Powers as well
as with many emerging Powers.
Today I see that the international community
is concerned about the danger of the old Cold War
returning. Major-Power relations are worsening,
fuelled by mutual suspicion. Relationships that were
previously stable and cooperative are now marked by
volatility and tension. That benefits no one, and we
should therefore not let it become permanent. The
major Powers — indeed, all of us — have an obligation
to work together to resolve the major issues of our time.
To mention only a few, we must end the suffering of
the Palestinians in Gaza and the rest of the occupied
territory and deliver the still elusive two-State solution.
We must resolve the conflict in Ukraine that is now
upsetting relations between Russia and the West. And
we must find an effective and durable solution to the
ongoing conflicts in Syria and Iraq.
To do all of this, there must be mutual
accommodation. There must be a forward-looking
attitude that embraces a win-win predisposition
rather than a zero-sum attitude. Diplomacy must take
precedence. The deficit of trust must be transformed
into strategic opportunities and confidence-building.
It is not enough just to call for peaceful coexistence.
That is so twentieth century. Here in the twenty-first
century, we need much more than conditions in which
world Powers merely peacefully coexist. We need those
Powers to work passionately together in order to foster
strategic cooperation and to tackle global issues. They
must begin to turn the trust deficit into a new strategic
trust not only among themselves but also with emerging
Powers and with all nations of the United Nations. Is
that possible? I would say a resolute yes, for that is
what has transpired in South-East Asia. In the second
half of the 1960s, South-East Asian nations were poor,
divided and insecure, threatened by a war raging in
their neighbourhood and ignorant of one another after
centuries of separation during the colonial past.
The establishment of the Association of Southeast
Asian Nations enabled countries in the region to form
the habit of dialogue and consultation with one another
and to learn to trust one another. Today, we can proudly
say that the once-divided 10 South-East Asian nations
now belong to ASEAN-10. Together, they are all drivers
of regional affairs and masters of their own destiny. A
number of sensitive inter-State and intra-State conflicts
have been peacefully resolved. Those that remain are
being addressed through dialogue and negotiation.
Economic interdependence has become the norm of the
day.
Moreover, South-East Asia is on the verge of
becoming a true community. We regard that as the apex
of strategic trust, which we believe can be replicated
everywhere. The culture of peace and coexistence
that we are trying to attain in Indonesia and in the
ASEAN region is clearly the antidote to the poison
of fundamentalist prejudice and deep intolerance, as
practised by a terrorist group in Iraq and Syria that
falsely defines itself as the Islamic State. The ideology
of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant not only
betrays the true teaching of Islam as a religion of peace
but also harms and seriously upsets the Islamic Ummah
throughout the world.
It has been a great privilege to forge closer bonds
between Indonesia and all nations represented in this
great assembly, the United Nations. As I look back,
I must admit that there remain many challenges that
Indonesia must resolve. Some of our efforts are already
on the right track. In a world desperately grappling
with climate change, we are progressively and boldly
applying a moratorium on deforestation — our
important contribution to reducing carbon emission. In
a world of economic uncertainty, we have increased our
national income per capita by 400 per cent within just
a short decade.
In a world witnessing rising extremism, Indonesia
continues to hold firm to the values of freedom,
tolerance, moderation and multiculturalism, which
form the basis of our nationhood. In a world still
burdened by insurgencies, we have managed to find
a permanent peaceful political solution to end the
30-year conflict in Aceh province. In a world marked
by turbulent transitions in the Middle East, time and
again we have shown to our people and to the world
that, in Indonesia, democracy, Islam, modernity and
human rights go together.
In a world often stigmatized by the past, Indonesia
has opened a entire new chapter of peaceful relations
with Timor-Leste on the basis on equality and mutual
respect. In a world where territorial disputes often
erupt into open conflicts, Indonesia has continued to
peacefully resolve, one by one, the overlapping maritime
borders with Vietnam, the Philippines, Singapore and
other nations.
The Indonesian and South-East Asian experiences
underscore the dawn of a new age of globalism for the
twenty-first century — a world that openly embraces
change as opposed to being intimidated by it. What the
world so desperately needs today is a pioneering spirit:
the boldness to break old boundaries and to create new
frontiers. Given that spirit, I believe that humankind
can overcome the challenge of climate change, conquer
poverty, eradicate social injustice, hasten the global
economic recovery and create a culture of peace among
all religions, including the Abrahamic faiths. In that
spirit, we can, hopefully, end the cycle of violence,
hatred, fear and humiliation that has made so many
conflicts around the world seem intractable for decades
and centuries.
In saying that, I am neither a Utopian nor a blind
idealist in understanding international relations.
However, I believe that, with a strong commitment and
political will, we can make the impossible possible. As
we say in Indonesia, where there is a will, there is a
way. We must drive the frontiers of nationalism into
a new globalism, where we can devise solutions to
national, regional and global issues at the same time.
We must achieve a new globalism, where no nation is
left behind and no nation dominates and where rights
are protected and responsibilities are met. In the world
of a new globalism, wars are unthinkable. In the first
place, wars are fought because nations play a zero-
sum game, where the winners take all and the losers
weep — the game of us against them, which the “us”
must win and the “them” must lose. Winners today are
losers tomorrow.
Let me conclude by saying that now is the time for
all of us to start the serious business of building a new
world of peace, prosperity and justice and of making
everybody a winner by creating and nurturing the new
all-inclusive “we” that leaves no one behind.