Allow
me at the outset to express my sincerest
congratulations to Mr. Srgjan Kerim on his assumption
of the presidency of the General Assembly at its sixty-
second session. Argentina welcomes the new
Secretary-General, Mr. Ban Ki-moon, and expresses its
support for his efforts at the head of the United
Nations.
As in previous years, we have come to the
General Assembly with the aim of revitalizing this
world body and with the firm belief that this will
ensure the effectiveness of international law in settling
disputes, thus successfully dealing with any threats to
peace.
The world is facing problems. The only hope we
have of resolving them lies in respect for
multilateralism, support for local customs, observance
of international norms and conventions by all
countries, and, of course, the full realization of human
rights.
For each individual country, and for the world as
a whole, peace will be possible only if we promote
equality and work to combat poverty and
marginalization. The world cannot and must not be a
place where violations of human rights are everywhere.
Peaceful coexistence is strengthened and maintained
through true solidarity between nations based upon a
concept of humanity that goes beyond the purely
military or the predominantly unilateral.
Our international policy is based on the values of
representative democracy, sovereignty of the people,
respect for fundamental human rights, and the active
upholding of international peace and security. Those
principles are shared by the vast majority of the
Argentine people. They help to focus the Government’s
activities and are reflected in the decisions taken by the
Argentine Republic at the international level.
We firmly support the construction of more just
and equitable societies that distribute more equitably
the benefits of economic growth. We know that each
country must have the right to seek out its own
development model, without external pressure.
The past few years have been very testing for us.
Considerable efforts have been made to rescue a nation
that barely five years ago was in the throes of an
unprecedented social and economic crisis. At the time,
many people thought that recovery might be
impossible. But day by day, with a great deal of effort
and humility, we revived production in a country
burdened by a foreign debt that threatened our future
with its conditions and constraints.
Argentina — a developing country which once
demonstrated that it is truly possible to climb the social
ladder; a country of immigrants where workers once
succeeded in sending their children to university; a
country once without illiteracy and having almost
banished child mortality — had been reduced to a
country of workers demoralized by unemployment,
children begging in the streets instead of going to
school, and the elderly living off miniscule pensions
and becoming dependent on their children and
grandchildren.
Our country’s coffers had been emptied owing to
the rigid application of the rules of the International
Monetary Fund (IMF). As a corollary, there was
violence in the streets, and Argentina experienced an
institutional crisis, with presidents lasting only days.
For the first time, Argentina sent off its own children
into an unprecedented economic exile.
Today the Argentine State has won its autonomy
and itself administers the variables of its
macroeconomy as best it can in the current
international environment. It pursues a sound,
disciplined and predictable economic policy within a
stable and democratic framework.
Our capacity for revitalization has allowed us,
even without receiving funding, to begin cancelling our
net debt with international organizations. We have even
paid off in advance all of our debt with the IMF — an
IMF that supported and promoted Governments that
were self-supporting, adjusting and patching up their
budgets, but at the cost of increasing the poverty of
their people, promoting deindustrialization and
irresponsibly plunging the country into debt.
Faced with the incredulous criticism of the
promoters of orthodox prescriptions, Argentina, thanks
to cautious monetary policies, disciplined public
expenditures and a healthy budget surplus that enabled
it to face or mitigate potential foreign crises, has
reduced the debt and registered an annual growth rate
of 9 per cent during the past five years. This was the
strongest uninterrupted economic expansion of any in
the past 100 years.
Today we represent the empirical proof that there
is life after the Fund and also the certitude that other
paths can lead to development and integration. We
serve as a reminder of the unreliability of models that
claim to be universally valid and the revindication of
the right of countries to choose their own path,
benefiting from international experience while
prioritizing their national interests and circumstances
above any other interest. Our case provides proof that
the international economic architecture must be
reformed, in particular that of IMF. The Fund is an
exponent of an old world order that is no longer valid.
Our case demonstrates the need for change in the
multilateral financial institutions so that they can
cooperate in the development of the less-well-endowed
nations and help to fight poverty and generate true
options for progress.
We are thinking, not of economic growth as
defined by economic experts or historians, but of
growth that has a strong social component and an
emphasis on equity, where citizens are the focus of the
results. Whereas one fourth of the labour force
experienced the humiliation of being unemployed,
unemployment has been reduced to 7.8 per cent since
we have taken office. We are speaking, not about just
any sort of work, but about appropriate and decent
work of the kind we advocated at the most recent
summit meeting of the Americas, which was held in
our country.
Thanks to a productive policy that generates
added value and, in addition, appeals to private
enterprises to show social responsibility, we are
reindustrializing Argentina. The economic indicators
posted by our country today would have been
impossible were it not for the complementarity of
action between the State and the private sector.
Our sales to all destinations have doubled over
the past four years, with a 16 per cent annual growth
rate. Investments have improved substantially: gross
domestic fixed investment has increased for the past 17
consecutive quarters; the ratio of investment to GDP is
between 20 and 23 per cent — in stark contrast to the
level of 2002 when it was hardly more than 11 per
cent.
When faced with that crisis almost five years ago,
we felt compelled to maintain essential assistance
policies for the most vulnerable segments of our
population. We do not regret those policies, and today
we can state that the true solution to the serious social
problems affecting our country, and many others
around the world, lies in providing jobs, health care
and education.
In the area of health, Argentina has launched a
national policy that includes prescriptions for generic
drugs and the provision of essential medications free of
charge. It also strengthens maternity and child
programmes and everything that relates to primary
health care, in line with the goals of equity and
protection. This has enabled us to compensate in part
for the disastrous state of the public health sector a
short time ago.
Of course, education is an essential element for
renewing the social and moral fabric of the nation,
even though the time horizon for its effects to be felt is
longer than those of other public policies. In order to
remedy the tragic situation that signalled the
breakdown of society and the failure on the part of the
State to protect those who were most vulnerable, a new
law on national education was passed. It will again
focus on ensuring equality of opportunity through
guaranteed access to a quality education throughout the
territory that is linked to the labour market and
includes excellent training for teachers. Under the new
law, a deadline of 2010 has been set, by which time
6 per cent of the gross national product will be used to
finance education.
In this context of steady recovery, Argentina’s
foreign policy is being strengthened and expanded,
with a clear and decisive commitment to the national
interest. Regional integration is a priority. Over the
past two decades, through the Common Market of the
South (MERCOSUR), Argentina has strengthened its
commercial ties with the countries of the region. But
its trade relations go far beyond the region. In that
sense, multilateral negotiations within the World Trade
Organization are of particular importance because the
liberalization of our agricultural sector — in which our
country has clear competitive advantages — depends
on them, as does the adequate flexibility we need to
carry out our industrial policies.
More equitable and fairer rules in international
trade are of great importance to Argentina. We
therefore participate actively in multilateral economic
negotiations with the firm goal of achieving equity in
the norms that govern world trade and of reversing the
discrimination erected against our main products
through tariff barriers and other trade-distorting
instruments imposed by the developed countries.
Argentina will be present in all multilateral
forums, where we will participate to ensure more
equitable and democratic rules. Multilateralism is the
most effective instrument for winning the battle against
hunger, poverty, exclusion and environmental
degradation.
Everything I have said here is both cause and
consequence of institutional stability and respect for
the rule of law. The three pillars of the Argentine State
are making decisions to combat impunity and preserve
memory, truth, and justice. We have begun bringing to
justice those guilty of serious human rights violators.
Those who imagined themselves having escaped with
impunity are fiercely resisting justice and, in an
attempt to intimidate witnesses, have caused the
disappearance of one witness, Julio Lopez. They have
thereby sent a dark message to a society that is seeking
the truth about the crimes against humanity which they
committed, and that condemns such acts.
Unconditional respect for human rights is our
new national paradigm. In the past, we were known
throughout the world for violations of those rights;
today, as we strive to find the truth and to punish the
guilty, we also seek to defend those rights worldwide.
Argentina, the Mothers and Grandmothers of the
Plaza de Mayo in the monumental dignity of their
struggle, and the Argentine people have personally
suffered under the inefficiency of a broken multilateral
human rights system. Their sole comfort were the very
precious humanitarian gestures of individuals,
organizations and countries. While people were being
kidnapped, tortured and killed in my country, the
mechanisms established precisely to condemn and
prevent such horrors remained silent. It is in their
memory, so that this will never happen again, that we
support the new Human Rights Council and hope that it
will live up to the expectations of the international
community.
My Government has endorsed instruments of
great importance, including the International
Convention for the Protection of All Persons from
Enforced Disappearance, adopted by this Assembly on
20 December 2006, which we signed in Paris on
6 February. That instrument, along with the Convention
on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the
Optional Protocol of the Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against
Women, gives continuity and concrete form to a policy
that ascribes a central role to the promotion of human
rights.
In our public policy, we now focus on
environmental protection, but we know that there will
be no viable solution without cooperation among all
the countries of the world, the industrialized countries
in particular, because the nature of the problem is of a
global scale.
The issue of climate change should be of concern
to all Governments, because no corner of the planet is
unaffected by changes that have been identified as due
to human activity. The Secretary-General’s convening
of yesterday’s High-level Meeting was a timely
manifestation of the urgent need to strengthen
international cooperation as an effective and adequate
response to protect the environment and prevent the
unacceptable exportation of pollutants to the
developing countries.
One after the other, various diplomatic efforts to
halt the violence in the Middle East once and for all
have failed, but we cannot merely throw up our hands.
No military solution will lead to peace and the
tranquillity that all the peoples of the region so
desperately call for. The invasion of Iraq, which we
rejected at the time it occurred, is the tragic and painful
proof of the truth of our position. The Security Council
and the nations of the Quartet have the heavy
responsibility of accompanying and, if possible,
guiding a peace process that can succeed with courage
and great perseverance.
The Argentine Republic continues, year after
year, tirelessly to condemn the serious threat of
terrorism throughout the world. We believe that all acts
of terror are criminal and unjustifiable and that no
argument can justify them. Just as no nation of the
world is beyond their reach, the response must be a
joint effort of all nations, and especially this
Organization, to stop and eliminate this scourge. We
cannot tolerate the actions of those responsible for
terrorism or of those who defend, finance or protect
terrorists, be they individuals or countries.
Argentina has twice suffered terrorist attacks. The
Israeli embassy was attacked in 1992 and the AMIA
headquarters in 1994. Some 102 members of our
community, some of whose relatives are here with us
today, lost their lives. Those victims, united by terror to
those of this city, those of Madrid, those of London,
those of Bali, those of Istanbul and those of many other
places, impose upon us the moral mandate to respect
their memories and to commit all our energies to
hunting down, finding and prosecuting those
responsible.
Despite the difficulties that have arisen through
the passage of time, given that those attacks took place
13 and 15 years ago, respectively, and the subsequent
cover-ups, our interest and the justice system continue
to seek the truth, and we keep our memory of the
horror alive so that it will not recur.
In November last year, the Argentine justice
system called for international cooperation in the
apprehension of nine people suspected of having
initiated and planned the 18 July 1994 attack on AMIA,
and the Executive Committee of INTERPOL
unanimously recommended the apprehension of six
Iranian citizens and one Lebanese involved in the
affair. We call here for that recommendation to be
ratified during the November session of the
INTERPOL General Assembly.
In that context, we hope that the Islamic Republic
of Iran, in the context of applicable international law,
will accept and respect Argentina’s legal jurisdiction
and cooperate effectively with Argentine judges to
bring to justice those involved in these events. In that
respect, I wish to say here, at United Nations
Headquarters and before all the countries of the world,
that, unfortunately, the Islamic Republic of Iran has to
date failed to offer the required cooperation with the
Argentine justice system to resolve those issues.
We call on the Secretary-General and on all the
nations of the world to persuade the Islamic Republic
of Iran to allow the judicial process to move forward.
We do so with the sole aim of clarifying the facts and
bringing those responsible to justice. Respect for the
memory of our 102 victims requires justice to be
carried out. We request the Islamic Republic of Iran to
cooperate in the implementation of the norms of
international law to allow us to come to nothing more,
but nothing less than the truth.
Nations big and small, rich and poor, all
throughout the world will be highly vulnerable if we
fail to grasp that action against terrorism requires
urgent multilateral, intelligent and sustained action
firmly anchored in legitimacy, respect for individual
rights, proportional response and respect for
international public opinion.
Efforts to counter the proliferation of weapons of
mass destruction can count on the firm support and full
participation of the Argentine Republic.
My country is known for the active role it plays
in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. Argentina
develops, consumes and exports nuclear energy for
peaceful purposes in the framework of the strictest
respect for the norms enshrined in the Treaty on the
Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and the
non-proliferation regime in its broadest sense.
Efforts to prevent proliferation are ethically and
legally correlated to progress on disarmament. Indeed,
the legal instruments on which the prohibition of
weapons of mass destruction is based specifically on
the firm commitment not to develop new weapons of
terror and destruction in the understanding that those
who possess such weapons will proceed to their
gradual and effective elimination.
In recent years, we have seen disarmament
commitments permanently eroded. Nuclear arsenals
remain disproportionately large and nuclear
disarmament agreements are in stasis. It should come
as no surprise, then, that, given the situation, there are
those who question the legitimacy of pursuing
unilateral advocacy for non-proliferation while solemn
commitments in the area of disarmament are ignored.
Conventional weapons are responsible for the
deaths of millions of people around the world. Our
country has given a high priority to initiatives
associated with the conclusion of an arms trade treaty.
Domestically, we have initiated programmes for the
voluntary handover of firearms, the initial results of
which have been encouraging.
The reform of the Security Council is still
pending. We are hoping for a reform that will make this
central body more responsible, democratically
representative and dynamic. It will not, however,
achieve this objective by creating new privileged
categories. We trust that the ongoing process of
consultations will be successful so that the Council can
be adapted to today’s world.
Before concluding I wish to raise a matter of
continuing importance to the Argentine Republic: the
question of the Malvinas Islands, which include South
Georgia, South Sandwich and the maritime areas
surrounding those islands. This year, 174 years will
have passed since the British began to occupy this part
of Argentine national territory. Ever since that act of
force in 1833, my country has protested against this
illegal occupation and has demanded that the full
exercise of its sovereignty be restored.
We would also mention that 2007 marks the
twenty-fifth anniversary of the 1982 conflict in the
South Atlantic, a conflict unleashed by the military
dictatorship without the backing of the Argentine
people, who had always endeavoured to find a peaceful
solution to its legitimate sovereignty claim.
The General Assembly has dealt with this matter
on many occasions, both prior to and since 1982.
Starting in 1965, when the Assembly adopted
resolution 2065 (XX), the Organization has recognized,
year after year, the existence of a sovereignty dispute
between Argentina and the United Kingdom relating to
the question of the Malvinas Islands. It urged the two
Governments to negotiate, as soon as possible, a
peaceful, just and lasting solution to the dispute, taking
into account the relevant resolutions of United Nations
bodies and the interests of the people of the islands.
The ongoing and unrenounceable objective of
regaining the full exercise of Argentine sovereignty
over this part of our territory and the permanent
readiness of my country to resume negotiations aimed
at finding a solution to the dispute have been reflected
in our national Constitution.
It is incomprehensible to us that the United
Kingdom should be unwilling to negotiate this matter,
thereby violating the provisions of General Assembly
resolution 2065 (XX) and numerous similar
resolutions.
The time has come for the United Kingdom to
shoulder its responsibility and put an end to an
anachronism: the illegal occupation for clearly colonial
purposes of territory belonging to another State.
My Government vigorously rejects the British
claim on the establishment of maritime areas
surrounding the archipelagos. In particular, it rejects
the recently divulged intention of the United Kingdom
to make a submission to the Commission on the Limits
of the Continental Shelf — established by the United
Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea — relative
to the outer limits of the continental shelf of these
Argentine territories.
In this, my last message to the General Assembly
as the President of the people of Argentina, I wish to
reaffirm our profound conviction that it is only through
democracy, accompanied by freedom, social justice
and peace, that man can realize his full potential. This
Assembly of the peoples has a bounden duty to help
ensure that that will come to pass.