Belize

In this fifty-first year of the United Nations, we are particularly happy to see Mr. Razali Ismail presiding over this Assembly. This is in no small measure due to his well-deserved high reputation. In large measure, too, our joy comes from my Government’s appreciation of the deep commitment of his Government to national and international economic improvement with equity. We are grateful, too, for the excellent services rendered by his predecessor, Mr. Diogo Freitas do Amaral, in a year in which, under his guidance, reform of the United Nations system truly gathered momentum. Today it is often remarked that there are many signs of the diminishing role of national sovereignty. In the sphere of human rights, the regional adjudicatory systems continue to flourish. Scrutiny is increasingly given by the regional bodies and by such other groupings as the Commonwealth of nations. We have good reason to believe that the new commonwealth of Portuguese- speaking nations will soon travel along the same path. At 21 the United Nations, the General Assembly, the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the Commission on Human Rights and the human rights treaty bodies all continue to scrutinize States for their rectitude in the field of human rights. It certainly seems that the High Commissioner for Human Rights, together with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and other executive agencies, are performing a useful watchdog and catalytic function. While this Organization’s efforts at humanitarian intervention have not been overwhelmingly successful, they have certainly provided evidence of the probable reality that absolutist notions of State sovereignty are in decline. Thus, we witness the acknowledgement, by States, of shared interests which contribute to enhanced cooperation in joint efforts to combat the trafficking of narcotics and to preserve and regenerate the environment. Recently, too, the Organization of American States launched an initiative that points in the same direction: the inter-American convention against corruption. Corruption has been a scourge throughout our region, as it is elsewhere. In our region, therefore, we have determined drastically to reduce its impact, even if that might have implications for State sovereignty. In the same way, the flurry of conventions and new organizations on the global environment, and the outpourings of the recent global conferences and summits on social and other issues bear witness to the rapid erosion of absolutist notions of sovereignty. During the past year efforts have been to bring into being the long-awaited International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea. Despite certain regrettable limitations, the Appellate Body of the World Trade Organization, the new tribunal for international trade disputes, has now issued its first judgment. We have also settled down to serious work in preparing for an international criminal court, just as the Tribunals for the prosecution of war crimes in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda are getting under way. These all constitute a significant development in the international system, in which the State and its citizens are increasingly made subject to international scrutiny. We must insist, however, that what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. We therefore expect that large States, as well as small States, will fully submit themselves to these new Tribunals. We also fully expect that powerful States will refrain from exerting their sovereign wills over smaller or weaker States. On a different subject, we have also witnessed a certain contraction of the public sector both within nations and international organizations. The attrition of the national budgets of capital-exporting and donor countries has had a domino effect on international organizations and capital-importing and recipient countries. So-called reductions in force and other forms of structural adjustment have therefore become a painful way of life. In this respect, this Organization and my country and many others have not been spared. At the same time, my country and many others have now established modern and rational systems for the imposition and collection of indirect taxes and other revenues. I refer especially to the value-added tax, the use of which is now virtually universal. Like most Governments, mine has had to trim several vital services. Everywhere, Governments are obliged to experiment with the privatization of many former State functions and have liquidated large chunks of State property. Even as these changes occur within many economies and Governmental structures, other actors have stepped onto the national and international stage. These actors, of course, include civil society and the non-governmental organizations, which now participate in almost every aspect of life. At the same time, we are trying to understand and cope with the novel phenomenon of globalization. Globalization has several positive aspects, especially liberalization, which it presupposes. However, globalization also seems to presuppose the universalization of mammoth private-sector enterprises and associations. This universalization is accompanied by revision or, in places, the reversal of aspects of such legal and economic doctrines as those that disapproved of excessive industrial combinations and monopolies. Nevertheless, globalization is a logical accompaniment to the reduction of the scope of sovereignty. But just as a loss of national autonomy is not an unalloyed blessing, this newfangled gigantism is too massive to be swallowed whole. For one thing, globalization as we are witnessing it today is an unprecedented phenomenon, even for the former empires. Whatever its advocates may say, it sometimes seems to contradict our very humanity, since the micro-dimension should never be neglected in the face of the macro-dimension. Both dimensions are essentially complementary. Globalization, furthermore, sometimes denies the tenets of, and the recent directions in, individual and collective human rights. This is because, 22 when it is taken to its logical extreme, as it is in several places, it seems to lead to an international euthanasia. It contributes to a “dinner-table scraps” mentality, or a “crabs- in-the-basket” attitude, whereby the disadvantaged might starve to death or destroy others in order to survive, while those who are more advantaged are enabled to gorge even more. Furthermore, certain forms of assertive globalization also fly in the face of diversity. They are anathema to cultural, social and economic pluralism, whose validity is uncontrovertible in socio-biological terms. As globalization is increasingly manifested in the electronic and communications media, these problems loom very large as, throughout the world, we see our youth taking on the mind-sets and the habiliments of corrupt, alien trend-setters who are mainly interested in purveying unnecessary products and creating false desires. As well we know, the consequences are often mindless violence and sexual and other exploitation of women, children and the weak. Surely this Organization must seek to ensure that these consequences are eradicated. Globalization and the decline of State sovereignty evidence the dramatic changes sweeping the globe, a subject on which many of us often comment from this rostrum. Change is indeed the order of the day, and change, in these specific respects, is actually part and parcel of this Organization and its Charter. After all, despite the fact that some would spin theories to the contrary, the very conception of the United Nations Charter was an enthronement of the doctrine of reduced sovereignty. Only by reducing sovereignty could the excesses that were evident before and during the Second World War be curtailed. Clearly, the very conception of the United Nations presupposes a type of essential globalization. It is therefore surprising how, in some quarters, globalization by private economic actors pursuing or motivated by the dictates of acquisitiveness, cupidity or what is referred to as “efficiency” can be applauded, while similar but much more modest behaviour by groups of sovereigns is now decried. We urge that one crucial key to meaningful reform of the United Nations must surely be enthronement of this Organization’s globalism. We must, indeed, enhance efficiency by rationalizing the managerial structure of the United Nations and the ways in which we select its executives, as was intelligently suggested in the latest edition of the important study by Urquhart and Childers, entitled A World In Need of Leadership. We must act globally by harnessing in common the shared resources of the planet. We repeat our call from previous general debates that this Organization, in keeping with its global function, must be given autonomous revenue authority in certain areas not presently in the domain of nation States. We must acknowledge the utility of the concept of a modest, truly representative and revocable trusteeship over certain ocean and aerial spaces. We may also wish to acknowledge the fact that the nuclear Powers are merely revocable trustees over nuclear weapons, even as we move towards ending all forms of nuclear testing and comply with the recent Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice requiring the prompt negotiation, in good faith, of nuclear disarmament. At the same time, we must eradicate everywhere the bitter arsenals of mines and other injurious weapons and noxious substances, and ensure that substances such as nuclear waste do not pass through our territorial or other waters. Responsible globalism will reap for the world the fruits of the promises made in connection with this Organization’s wartime antecedents: that economic, social and all other forms of development are the absolute heritage of under-possessed and dispossessed individuals, peoples and nations. We are under a strict obligation to keep this Organization’s Agenda for Development on the front burner. Belize has proposed that we should establish an annual special session of this Assembly immediately prior to the general debate, at which we would discuss development policy and regenerate the political will necessary continually to revise the complex Agenda for Development and the commitments made in this Assembly, as well as at the high-level global conferences of this last decade of the twentieth century. At that annual session, we could also effectively discuss certain specific portions of the Second Committee items currently discussed during the regular session. Enlightened globalism will compel us, with alacrity and dignity, to make good the humanitarian obligations of this “one world” to the least-developed countries, to Africa, to small developing islands and low-lying developing coastal areas like Belize, to land-locked countries and to other disadvantaged places. We should be happy to do so without repeating any of the recent tired, uncharitable and inaccurate nostrums about the death of the obligation to accord economic preferences to poor countries, even as we clamour that human rights and 23 humanitarianism have now been elevated to a place of honour in the international pantheon. Even as we extol the virtues of United Nations globalism, we can discern another antidote or counterpart to the gigantism of private-sector globalization. This is the phenomenon of regionalism. Regionalism is the concept that drives many current proposals — including those of Belize — for reform of the United Nations Security Council and is a suggested basis for the selection of additional so-called permanent members — privileged, although not serving indefinitely. Incidentally, such a selection could be done entirely within the region or, as is done in many cases at present, by the Assembly. Regionalism is the essence of Belize’s proposals for shared seats on the Security Council, whereby adjacent or proximate States can pool their resources to serve the international community in that rather expensive enterprise. We gratefully acknowledge the fact that Belize’s proposals have attracted some attention. Even as portions of Central Africa appear to teeter on the brink, regionalism has been relatively effective and remains the main hope for preserving peace and security in several parts of this troubled world. It acknowledges the reality that the Organization is not structured to carry out peacemaking and peacekeeping undertakings on a sustained basis. My delegation also believes that regionalism can become a critical element in the quest successfully to confront the menace of narcotics without leading to unwitting hegemonism. We now see an abundance of formal arrangements for subregional integration. These are occurring throughout the five regions of the United Nations. Informal arrangements also abound. These lead us to urge nations in all parts of the world, as well as the global body politic, to explore functional cooperation on a regional and subregional basis, as we now try to do within the Association of Caribbean States and as we have done for centuries in several sub-areas of the Caribbean. We are now witnessing much fruitful regional liberalization and the integration of labour markets, competition policy, labour standards, monetary systems, investments, technical cooperation and trade. We are happy to witness such functional regionalism in Africa, Asia, Europe and other parts of Latin America. We are also witnessing a reordering of the globe as new regions are identified and new relationships developed between regions. Thus, instead of imagining that the Pacific islands are worlds apart from the Caribbean and Central America, as we did when we looked eastward at them, we now see them as neighbouring fellow citizens of the tropics as we look westward at them over our fragile isthmus of Central America. From this geopolitical vantage point as well, we see East Asia as a partner to the Caribbean and Central America. This helps us appreciate that the contemporary approach to statehood fully justifies the aspirations of a democratic Asian country that is one of the most substantial players in the global economy for a greater measure of political participation in the system of international organizations. That country is Taiwan. In the view of my delegation, such participation would be quite consistent with prevailing notions of sovereignty. At the same time, it is assumed that the territorial integrity of the People’s Republic of China would be completely unimpaired. We believe that the statehood and dignity of the latter ancient, honourable and global Power should and would be safeguarded in any situation we have posited. Without meaning to interfere, we would hope that, in this connection, as has been stated in other contexts in these remarks, noblesse oblige. Turning to another region, we must reiterate our concern about the recent retardation of the peace process between Israel and its neighbours. Again, we call for improvement of conditions in southern Lebanon and elsewhere and for the genuine autonomy that is the birthright of the Palestinians. Finally, we wish to suggest that regionalism, including functional cooperation, will contribute significantly to the fulfilment of the millennial dreams of the architects of this great global Organization.