Italy

I would like to express our warmest congratulations to Guyana and to you personally, Sir, on your election to the presidency of the General Assembly at its forty-eighth session. I am also pleased that in the past year the United Nations family has grown to include the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Andorra, Monaco and Eritrea. We wish to extend a special welcome to the last two in view of our long-standing historic and human ties. Italy, deeply committed to European political and economic unity, shares the views expressed by the Belgian Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is the current Chairman of the European Council. We are not simply voicing conventional wisdom if we stress the depth of the transformations that define the times in which we live. Every day brings forth new proof that the end of the cold war has brought us to a watershed. We must carefully decipher the lessons and courageously shoulder the new tasks with which this moment has presented us. As the Secretary-General said in Milan, international law is the main instrument at our disposal; it is not merely a regulatory instrument but the very language of the relations between States. But the social pressures we are now facing are profoundly new, generating changes that international law must begin to reflect as it translates new needs into new institutions. If today we believe we can govern this transformation, and if we refuse to yield to the disorderly growth of a new international order, we have first and foremost the renewed vitality and prominence of the United Nations to thank. The United Nations has evolved on the foundation of practices that are solidly inscribed in the Charter, while discovering new ways to pursue its aims. Take peace-keeping, a practice from the United Nations earliest days that has recently acquired a special role. Today peace is more likely to be threatened by the explosion of internal conflicts (though at times with transnational components) than by acts of open aggression across international borders. Peace-keeping, peace-enforcement, and humanitarian relief missions all take place in the midst of conflicts with complex political causes, and tangled ethnic and national roots. In such an environment, the traditional juxtaposition of diplomacy and military action no longer corresponds to the reality of the present, and a broad initial mandate is not sufficient concretely to define operations in the field. The unity of military command is an unquestionable principle, without which no operation can succeed. However, the political management of an operation cannot be confined strictly to military options, especially when the real issue is not the legitimacy of the use of force (which may be clearly authorized by the Security Council’s mandate), but its advisability and timing in view of the political objectives. I would add that in situations involving crowds of civilians, we must consider making it our policy always to give pride of place to the use of non-lethal anti-riot equipment. This is not only an Italian concern. Spokesmen for other countries have also stressed that countries contributing troops to United Nations peace-keeping missions need mechanisms that would exempt their troops from passively abiding by orders that may be illegal, inconsistent, or in contradiction with the aims of the operation. The United Nations peace-keeping practices reveal an awareness of the need for adequate prior consultation of troop-contributing countries. To this end, while Article 29 of the Charter provides a general guideline for the establishment of bodies subsidiary to the Security Council, Article 44 could provide a more fitting solution to the problem. It provides for the Security Council to establish 16 General Assembly - Forty-eighth session consultative procedures with non-members of the Security Council that have been requested to contribute troops to peace-keeping and security operations. Today, even in the absence of formal agreements such as those provided for by Article 43, I believe we should extend Article 44, by analogy, to operations conducted under Chapter VII of the Charter. In his "An Agenda for Peace", the Secretary-General defined peace-building as laying the necessary political and socio-economic foundations for a lasting peace after the phase of open conflict has ended. The reconstruction - or the establishment - of legal and economic institutions in critical areas and countries represents the main prerequisite of an enduring peace. These premises form the basis of what Italy means to propose in order to move beyond the current situation in Somalia - a situation characterized somewhat by giving pride of place to the military aspect of the United Nations Operation in Somalia (UNOSOM) and by the standstill in the political process. We believe that it is essential that the United Nations step up its political efforts at peacemaking by appointing a personality of great international prestige to renew the political and diplomatic initiative with all the Somali factions. At the same time, the mechanisms of the Addis Ababa Conference should be reactivated in such a way as to increase the involvement of the African nations and their institutions in the normalization of Somalia. But the predominantly political nature of our operation to restore hope in Somalia must also be translated into the progressive reconstruction of Somalia’s basic economic and social structures and the reorganization of a government and its administrative structures. This requires broad development programmes, to which Italy’s commitment has remained unswerving even in the most difficult moments. Italy welcomes the renewed central role of the United Nations, and at the same time supports a reform of its institutional mechanisms. Let us first consider the possibility of a change in the membership of the Security Council. As Italy emphasized to the Secretary-General last June, since the Security Council is moving towards a future of greater burdens and responsibilities, its representativeness and effectiveness must develop in parallel. What we suggest is that, in addition to the permanent members with veto power and the non-permanent members, a third category be established. It would be made up of countries able to make a special contribution to achieving the objectives of the United Nations. What matters is not drawing up controversial lists, but identifying objective criteria for selection, based on economic factors, human resources, culture, and mass communications. These countries would rotate two at a time, thereby becoming semi-permanent members of the Council. We must all recognize the renewed central role of the United Nations in international relations, but avoid interpreting this role in exclusive terms. The regional dimension of multilateralism, which is described in Chapter VIII of the Charter, has today a great role. Take the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), which has been explicitly defined as a regional institution on the basis of the United Nations Charter. Italy is about to assume the chairmanship of the CSCE. We believe that it is being called on to play an increasing role, mainly in preventive diplomacy but also in peace-keeping and in fostering negotiated settlements. In this regional framework, we would welcome more stringent regulations on arms transfers that build on the present United Nations provisions. If it is true that without peace there can be neither development nor satisfaction of social needs, it is also true that conflict is fed everywhere not only by the urge to subjugate the adversary violently but also by the existence of social injustice, imbalance and poverty. The first and basic injustice is the violation of human rights. When the international community defends human rights, it is pursuing absolute and autonomous values that must be protected. At the same time, it is eradicating many of the causes of violence between groups and nations. We hope that an agreement between the groups will finally make it possible to end the fighting in Bosnia. However, as the international community prepares to support the implementation of an agreement, we must not forget the war crimes and the crimes against humanity committed during this tragic conflict. Thus, we applaud the establishment of the International Tribunal and hope that - impartial and free from political influences - it will begin its work at the earliest possible date. Where appropriate, the Tribunal should hand down tough sentences, although I take exception to the death sentence, which Italy firmly opposes on the basis of its time- honoured juridical traditions. Forty-eighth session - 30 September l993 17 I wonder if the international community could not summon the same determination to establish an international criminal court to prosecute the most serious human rights violations. Italy is convinced that human rights prosper in systems based on democracy and an open-market economy. That is why we firmly support Governments that are committed to such goals and work courageously through hardships and temporary crises. An issue of great contemporary relevance is the protection of minorities - which cannot be separated from the protection of individuals, for the two issues are based on the same hopes, the same principles of freedom and the same respect for cultural, religious and philosophical differences. Too often, the territorial integrity of the State has been contrasted with the rights of minorities. Instead, we must demonstrate that in a democracy, a democracy that leaves room for direct participation and for true pluralism of identity and choice, it is possible to balance these two equally worthy values. We must demonstrate that there is no contradiction between the protection of minorities and the stability of borders. On the contrary, as the experience of my country shows, they can reinforce each other. The principles, institutions and rights that make peace more solid are a primary consideration. But we must never underestimate the often-decisive role played by weapons. The accumulation and development of weapons endangers stability since the perception of a threat triggers actions that are harmful for peace and economically ruinous. That is why disarmament and non-proliferation, even in the post-cold-war era, must remain one of our main objectives and why we highly value the message delivered from this podium by the President of the United States. We need to complete past disarmament initiatives that we have agreed to and begun, and both confirm and expand existing tools. We strongly support the early ratification of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty II (START II). The Non-Proliferation Treaty must be strictly observed, which is why North Korea’s unclear attitude towards that Treaty is a matter of such great concern. That Treaty must also be strengthened and made universal. In 1995, we should all join together to renew the Treaty unconditionally and for an indefinite period. Today we are witnessing the emergence of a collective consciousness, the expansion of a shared system of values, an international citizenship based on common, objective interests and the spread of more uniform lifestyles. An Italian philosopher, Giambattista Vico, wrote: "Ultimately, once the cities got to know each other, having shared dealings in war, alliances and trade, they came, to an unprecedented extent, to the recognition of natural civic rights as a natural right of all peoples, that is of all united nations - as if the world were one large city - which is the law of humankind." That was written in the early eighteenth century. Faced with a world beset by multiple conflicts, in which individual nations or groups often pursue their interests through the use of force, it would be intellectually dishonest and morally reprehensible to adopt attitudes of resignation or fatalism. Violence is no more natural than peaceful coexistence and collaboration between peoples and groups. Acting against violence and for coexistence is therefore not only morally desirable, but actually practicable. One such possibility has been eloquently demonstrated in recent days by the hopeful development of a peaceful future in the Middle East thanks to the courage of the Israelis, the Palestinians and the Arab countries. As a Mediterranean country with a long tradition of active involvement in the cause of stability and peace in the area, Italy is ready to contribute further to help the entire region take the first steps on a long and complex journey toward peace and cooperation, with borders permanently defined in accordance with Security Council resolutions. The same possibility is confirmed by the promising steps being taken towards democracy and coexistence in South Africa. The awareness of the possibility and the moral duty to act must also inspire our attitude towards the economic and social problems that dehumanize the lives of millions of people all over the world. I am referring to development policies, which should be conducted in a spirit of solidarity and on the basis of multilateral coordination. Such coordination must also be extended to bilateral initiatives, while we also need closer cooperation between agencies. That approach has already produced successful results in Mozambique and Eritrea, and even in war-torn Somalia. It must now be applied to endorse the peace process in the Middle East. The donors’ conference about to open in Washington will provide an important occasion to translate our political support into action. We know the limits of our actions, and we cannot allow ourselves to be swayed by the temptations of noble but abstract Utopias. It is our responsibility to draw up 18 General Assembly - Forty-eighth session principles and instruments that are valid for the times in which we live and that can help us to manage and to transform in a more rational and humane way the reality that surrounds us. Each country must promote this action on its own or through alliances or other groups. But it is ultimately here, in the framework of this Organization and in view of its universal aims and membership, that each country will have to contribute to the solution of these problems. To do this, we must not limit ourselves to declaring principles but, rather, on the basis of those principles we must be willing to hand the United Nations the tools it needs. The international community - in other words, we as Member States - is giving the United Nations greater and greater responsibilities. But the responsibilities of the United Nations are our responsibilities. The problems of the United Nations are our problems.