Mr. President, your selection for the task of presiding over the eighteenth regular session of the General Assembly is a well-deserved tribute not only to your personal qualities as a diplomat, which have been amply demonstrated within these walls, but also to the great country which you represent. My Government and I myself are certain that, under your guidance, this session will live up to the requirements of the contemporary world; although unforeseeable and disquieting things may lie ahead of us, the prospects for mankind are unquestionably more hopeful today than they have been at the opening of past sessions. The honour and satisfaction thus conferred upon you will belong not only to our sister nation, Venezuela, but to all those Latin American peoples which are inspired by democratic ideals and governed in accordance with democratic principles.
2. I wish to pay a tribute to U Thant, the Secretary- General of our Organization. In the eyes of our peoples, his vigilance and skill have contributed decisively to the creation of the improved international atmosphere to which I have just referred. We wish, therefore, to declare our support of this man who has faithfully carried on the efforts begun by that other great figure who sacrificed his life in the cause of peace: Dag Hammarskjöld.
3. My delegation, my country and I personally wish to reaffirm our faith in the United Nations as an instrument for peaceful progress towards a better world as well as our intention of co-operating with this Organization in the effort to achieve as rapidly and as fully as possible the noble aims which it has set itself. The existence of the United Nations has not, of course, banished from the world the threats and dangers which can at any moment spring from emotion, misunderstanding, and various group and national interests; peoples and individuals cannot yet develop in a permanent atmosphere of mutual understanding. On a number of important occasions, however, action by the United Nations has served to prevent crises of the kind which in other times, and indeed in very recent times, have plunged countries and whole regions into grave difficulties. The United Nations has brought the triumph of reason over confusion, thus preventing or greatly mitigating much misery and pain. It has proved to be the only organization capable of reducing to a minimum the suffering which, alternating with a sense of satisfaction in being alive and in fulfilling our obligations, characterizes human existence.
4. If it is to improve its structure and achieve its aims more rapidly, or at all events come closer to achieving them, the United Nations must undergo basic changes which can be accomplished only through certain amendments of its constitutional instrument. Revision of the United Nations Charter is essential if the Organization is to be made more effective. The new nations whose independence and whose presence among us we older Members of the United Nations have greeted with such sincere pleasure in recent years cannot enter into the full exercise of their sovereign rights until they are on a footing of complete equality with other Member States. If we have welcomed their representatives to this General Assembly, why should we deny or limit their access to organs in which questions are raised and issues discussed which so directly and vitally concern their peoples? The United Nations is and must continue to be a living organism which keeps pace with the times. If it does not adapt to the demands of a world which is in a state of constant vertiginous change, it will end by becoming a decrepit anachronism.
5. The world of today Is not that of the fifty-one sovereign States which met at San Francisco in 1945, inspired by the lofty ideal of abolishing war as a means of settling international disputes and of promoting the welfare of individuals and nations. As a result of the application of the principles embodied in the Charter, our great world community now embraces 111 nations. As yet, however, neither the anatomy nor the physiology of the organs of the United Nations reflects this astonishing and salutary change. The act of justice which we have sought to perform by welcoming among us the nations which have with our aid thrown off the yoke of dependence and servitude has remained limited in scope and will ultimately be transformed into an act of flagrant injustice if we do not admit these nations to the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council and other United Nations organs. Accordingly, Costa Rica once again calls for amendment of the Charter and for the early convening of a general conference for the purpose of modernizing that document on an equitable basis, so that it reflects not only the needs of the present-day world but also the fact that the world of the immediate future will be even more varied and complex than that in which we now live.
6. Even if a majority of Member States feel that circumstances are not propitious for the convening of a general conference, there are certain minimum reforms which are urgently needed. We should, however, avoid any action that might restrict the participation in the principal United Nations organs of the group which always acted in a spirit of fairness when it represented a majority. My country is certain that, far from permitting its role in the United Nations to be curtailed, Latin America will affirm its participation in the Organization's activities, adding new chapters to the history of the Latin American countries in the United Nations and of the battles which they have fought and will continue to fight in defence of their ideals and interests.
7. In view of the limited time available, I shall confine myself to a few brief remarks concerning those items on the agenda of the present session which are of vital importance to the nations possessing only limited means of advancement and progress. The nations in what until recently the experts were wont to describe coldly as an "under-developed state” —a term whose slighting tone the substitute expression, "developing countries", is intended to soften— are of the opinion that development and under-development are not solely a matter of technical and material progress. There are, to be sure, countries and regions which are under-developed in a technical and material sense. However, there are also small countries with limited resources, and even territories still denied the right of self-determination, which, in spite of their spiritual and cultural traditions, cannot advance peacefully along the road of progress because their way is blocked by the ambitions and lack of understanding displayed by communities which, though highly developed from the technical and scientific point of view, show little respect for the right of other communities to decide their own future. Nazi Germany provided us, less than two decades ago, with a tragic example of this strange combination of technical progress and ethical and political backwardness. Our sense of dignity as free peoples forbids us to permit others to lay down hard and fast rules to guide us on the road of progress. We ask only that our urgent demands should be heard and satisfied on the basis of international co-operation. This will not only advance the cause of progress but also lay a solid foundation for peace —the goal towards which all of us, strong and weak alike, must direct every effort.
8. It is in the light of these considerations that we can grasp the full meaning of the work accomplished by the Special Committee on the Situation with regard to the Implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, which has done so much to promote decolonization, the Special Committee on the Policies of apartheid of the Government of the Republic of South Africa, the Social Commission, the Committee on Housing, Building and Planning, the Commission on International Commodity Trade, the Commission on Human Rights, the Special Fund, the Expanded Programme of Technical Assistance and other bodies whose efforts and objectives have earned our delegation's full support.
9. I should emphasize at this point that a spirit of international solidarity must prevail over traditional national and group interests at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development to be held in the spring of 1964 and, generally speaking, in all efforts to secure a more equitable distribution of wealth and prosperity among nations. While social inequality within a given national community always gives rise to upheaval which threatens the nation's life and its economic and political stability, the division of our world into groups of rich and poor nations tends to retard progress and, by creating a constant threat of war, to prevent the establishment of genuine and lasting peace. Hence, while national Governments pursue domestic policies aimed at eliminating potential causes of national disintegration by formulating and carrying out programmes of social justice, the great Powers must henceforth, if they are to ensure lasting peace in the world, give greater attention to what might be referred to as international social justice, i.e., work for the gradual but steady disappearance of the gulf which today separates the rich and poor nations.
10. Increasingly close mutual understanding and co-operation, both inside and outside the United Nations, among the underprivileged countries, i.e., the countries of Latin America, Asia and Africa, can contribute to a solution of their common material, cultural and moral problems. In that way, too, we of the poor nations will also be making a useful contribution to peace. I have already said that we must all try to advance the cause of peace. When we remember the difficulties that had to be overcome in order to obtain the Treaty banning nuclear weapons tests in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under water, it is easy to see what an effort will be required to bring about a treaty on general and complete disarmament, on which, in the final analysis, the future of all of us depends.
11. Costa Rica is determined to carry out those United Nations recommendations which are in keeping with the principles of the Organization. We are honoured to be represented in the Special Committee on apartheid and among its officers, and we have worked for the adoption of recommendations which will enable the United Nations to intensify its struggle against the policy of racial segregation pursued by the Government of South Africa. I should like to mention that the various measures taken by my country in support of the United Nations policy on apartheid have included the closing of our consular missions. We vigorously endorse and support the reports of the Special Committee, which serve to keep world public opinion informed about a cruel reality.
12. In conclusion, I should like to refer to an initiative taken by my delegation with a view to promoting agrarian reform programmes along democratic lines. For the developing countries, almost all of which are primarily agricultural, the rationalization of agriculture is essential to economic expansion and a balanced economy. A no less important aspect of agrarian reform is the social one, which has been not only recognized but strongly emphasized by the United Nations, by regional organizations and by so eminent a personage as Pope John XXIII, in his encyclical Mater et Magistra. In a memorandum which my delegation has submitted to the Secretary-General of the United Nations [A/5481 and Add.1 and Add.1/ Corr.1] in preparation for a draft resolution which we plan to introduce in the course of this session for consideration by the General Assembly, my delegation puts forward certain ideas and proposals which I shall not weary you by repeating here, I simply wish to reiterate my Government's desire to see the United Nations remedy a deficiency which is so obvious that it requires no lengthy comment. In the national and international programmes and studies aimed at bringing about an improvement in agricultural production through urgently needed economic and social reforms, one element is lacking which is essential to the success of agrarian reform programmes: provision for making funds available to Governments for the purpose of acquiring land so that it may be more equitably distributed and more effectively utilized. The special conditions and legal systems prevailing in many of the economically less developed countries require the Governments of those countries to pay compensation for land expropriated for those purposes. The draft resolution announced by the Permanent Mission of Costa Rica to the United Nations is aimed at finding a solution to these problems, which many countries with limited resources cannot solve by themselves. The various international and hemispheric agrarian reform programmes will prove ineffectual if land —the essential factor for their implementation— is lacking. I hope that our views on this matter will be understood and shared by a majority of Member States and that the initiative we have taken will lead to United Nations action on behalf of a programme of international assistance designed to meet this vital need.
13. My country feels that in its eighteen years of existence the United Nations has carried out its task of safeguarding peace and of securing justice for the peoples that wished to be free. We have been successful in gaining political independence for a great many States, although there are peoples still awaiting their liberation. In the atmosphere of peace in which this eighteenth session of the General Assembly is being held, however, let us take up the task of winning social justice for the great majority of the States assembled here. The prices of commodities on the world market are fixed in an inequitable manner by the wealthy countries that buy them, and the prices of manufactured goods are fixed, in just as inequitable a manner, by the wealthy countries that sell them. Until international justice exists, there will be no peace and no equality in the United Nations. Beginning with this Assembly, we, the poor countries of the world, must join, above and beyond all blocs, in a struggle for justice in international trade. While hunger exists, there can be no peace; while exploitation exists, there can be no harmony. We have already gained legal equality for 111 States; let us now seek to achieve social equality through an equitable system of world trade which will enable the workers of the poor countries to achieve a standard of living comparable to that prevailing in the wealthy countries.