Our debate is being held under the theme of restoring trust and reviving global solidarity. President Dennis Francis has rightly called on us to accelerate action to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals for peace, prosperity, progress and sustainability for all. He has called on us to rebuild international peace and security, to show leadership in the fight against climate change, and to support efforts to promote and ensure the full enjoyment of human rights by all. His priorities are also our priorities. We can sign off on them immediately.
To respond to global threats, from Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine to climate change, from poverty to pandemics, we must act. We cannot remain idle. We must act together, as truly united nations. It is important to ask ourselves: What does it mean to be united? I have a feeling that each of us has her or his own definition of what it means to be united these days. First, it means being able to count on each other. There are larger and smaller nations, and some are there to support the others.
My country is not the largest in size but has always believed that unity and the willingness to work with others have made it bigger and stronger. We are a founding Member of the United Nations, the European Union. NATO, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the Council of Europe. My country has always believed in the international order and the resolve to come together to build something together. As Europeans, we commit daily to defending the principles anchored in the Charter of the United Nations and to strengthening multilateralism. While many people believe that the solution to today’s problems is to build walls and cut ties. I am among those who are convinced that it is the readiness to build bridges that is the right solution.
I wish to speak of Luxembourg’s assistance for sustainable development. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Summit, held a few days ago. reminded us of the urgent need to redouble our efforts if we want to achieve the SDGs by 2030. We have seen the devastating effects of the coronavirus disease pandemic and Russia’s war against Ukraine lead to a deterioration of poverty indicators in many developing countries.
Luxembourg is determined to continue to show solidarity. For several years, we have devoted 1 per cent of our gross national income to public development assistance. Our support focuses on the least developed countries and basic social sectors. We have seen how. in many European countries, one of the first budget items to be cut when a new administration takes power is cooperation. It is true that it is not very popular to offer to help people at the far side of the world when some populists point to the problems at home. But the problems we have at home are rich people’s problems in most other countries of the world and their own problems are issues of survival, while ours can occasionally be overlooked.
Luxembourg had the honour of preparing, with South Africa, the High-Level Dialogue on Financing for Development, which was held on 20 September. The Dialogue made it possible to identify avenues for closing the SDG financing gap. In partnership with international financial institutions and the private sector, the aim is to mobilize the resources that developing countries need to get out of debt and ensure financing of the SDGs.
Our climate action is also not very popular these days, because it is never popular when we act to change people’s daily lives. People do not like it when we say that things must change, but we will be judged by future generations if we do not shoulder our responsibilities today. While we may need to take unpopular decisions, we must do so if we wish to preserve the quality of life we enjoy today. There are those who do not believe in climate change, and I have heard politicians express doubt about climate change from this very rostrum.
I do not know how it is in other countries, but in ours we have had tornadoes, floods and other unprecedented phenomena. Events on the far side of the world that we used to see on television are now happening at home. That is nothing compared to the situation being experienced by Heads of State and Government who have spoken here and do not know if their countries
will be able to resist or even exist in the long term. It is hard to imagine being a citizen of a country that could disappear under the melting icebergs. Let us think of that. What would you build for the future? How could you fight that phenomenon?
Luxembourg shares the Secretary-General’s commitment to solving the climate crisis. I was fortunate enough to be present when we reached the Paris Agreement on Climate Change in 2015. We must pursue that course. We will support negotiations at the twenty-eighth Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to establish the new Loss and Damage Fund to help developing countries that are particularly vulnerable. We are also strengthening our international climate finance, which is in addition to our official development assistance. My Government has just decided to increase Luxembourg’s contribution to the Green Climate Fund by 25 per cent for the period 2024-2027.
We also work in close cooperation with the European Investment Bank in the field of sustainable finance. Luxembourg’s financial centre, in particular our Luxembourg Green Exchange, has issued the first green bonds and mobilized private capital. In our Embassy only yesterday, we hosted colleagues from Cape Verde and Rwanda, and we were able to show that we can bring the private and public sectors together if we want to succeed. As public authorities, we cannot do it alone. If we want to succeed, we must be ready to bring in the private sector. Those who have not done so are very welcome to visit Luxembourg to see how the private and public sectors can come together and move forward.
I have just listened to the speaker before me talk about human rights. I am sure that if we asked all the representatives here today what human rights mean to each of them, we would find to our shame that in 2023 human rights still depend on where you are born. They depend on your religion. They depend on whether you are a girl or boy. They depend on your sexual orientation. It is still a shame to know that today, in 2023. human rights are different from one person to another depending on their place of birth. And it is not only about human rights. It is also about civil rights, economic rights, the right to education, the right to be different, the right of diversity, the rights of women, the right to choose for yourself rather than for someone else who thinks he knows better what is good for you to do so. That is the reality still in 2023. when we speak about universal human rights and when we speak about the United Nations. No. we are not united when we speak about human rights. The definition of human rights still depends today on where you were born, and I can affirm that that is not our best achievement.
And still we celebrate the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. For us. the defence of the human rights of women and children will stay a priority. We are also proud to have supported the initiative to create an institution for people who have disappeared in Syria.
We have to fight intolerance, and I would ask everyone just to be intolerant to intolerance. Is it still normal that nowadays, some political parties try to explain, for example, that the Second World War was not such a terrible period? One need only go to Auschwitz and see what happened there, where millions of Jewish people were killed. They were killed because they were Jewish. They were gypsies. They were gay or they were left-wing. If you go there you will see thousands and thousands of suitcases. You will see crutches. You will see hair. You will see glasses. And people were just a number. That was what happened on my continent and still today some people think that this is just a small part of our history. \
I thought we would have learned from the past when I see what also happened after the Second World War. When we see today that being gay. being lesbian or being trans is still a death penalty. I myself am gay; it is not my choice. I did not wake up this morning to ask myself why I am gay. The most difficult part was to accept myself. People must realize that being gay is not a choice. But being a homophobic is a choice, and we have to fight against people who do not accept diversity in our nations.
I could go on citing all the different epithets about religions, about antisemitism and anti-difference. When we speak about being in the United Nations and wanting to share values together, we still have to also play a role in international peace and security.
When I see the situation in Africa. I have to say that I am not reassured about what has happened. I take a special moment to think about my colleague. President Bazoum. As President of the Niger, his was one of the stable countries. He is now in custody. I want to inform the Assembly that for us it was also important
to support the African countries that condemned the coup. It is not about the power of the strongest, of the one who has the weapons, who has to win against the supporters of democracy. We have to continue to fight for this.
Is it normal that our procedures in the United Nations make it possible for a permanent member of the Security Council to block consideration of situations when we have all agreed that there is a problem? Last year. I sent a message to the Russian delegation, asking its members to listen to us and to try to stop that unnecessary war. I am among the few leaders who has had calls with President Zelenskyy and with President Putin. I was criticized for having made those calls, but I do not regret them. If we want to find solutions, we need to speak to one another. But when I realized that there was no will on the Russian side to find solutions or to save lives. I gave up.
So again. I say to the Russian delegation: There is no reason to kill innocent civilians, to rape women and to kill children. I grew up in peace. I have never lived through war. but on my continent we had a war in the former Yugoslavia not that long ago. And if I am free before the Assembly, it is because other countries supported Luxembourg. There is an American military cemetery for thousands of young guys and girls who did not even know where my country was. and yet they died for me to be able to sit in a free country today.
And that is the reason why we will not leave Ukraine alone. Ukraine has no choice, and we cannot accept that it is in the power of your biggest neighbour to decide what is good for you. I have seen it in my own lifetime, when Germany thought that it knew what was better for Luxembourg than we did. And so we will continue to support Ukraine. We will not leave it alone and we need to make the Russians understand that they have made the wrong decisions. We also need to sue. We cannot accept that crimes have been committed and will not be punished.
This is the eighth time that I have been able to deliver a speech before the General Assembly. I have been Prime Minister now for 10 years, since 2013. and I am proud of our contributions and the work my country has done in the United Nations during this period. We were an active member of the Security Council in 2013 and 2014. and during that powerful experience we also proposed ourselves for another candidacy for the Security Council for the term 2031-2032. In 2013. we also decided to be a candidate for the Council of Human Rights, and we were elected in October 2021 for the 2022-2024 mandate. In October 2022. we also presented our candidature for the UNESCO Executive Board for the period 2025-2029.
We have done all this not just to be a candidate or to sit in a room. We want to have added value when we put our candidature forward. Also, we want to continue to fight for what I said earlier. We want to continue being United Nations, for what it means to be united, and if we have differences we want to respect them and at least to convince, to exchange and to move on to become nations that are more united than we have been before, with young people and civil society. We should also really think about our procedures. Usually, when we follow our procedures everything is okay, but we have come to see that when we have troubles with a permanent member, it is difficult to move on. We also have to give a voice to the African countries today in those institutions.
To conclude, when our nations are truly united, as I said earlier, wherever you were born, whatever your parents did. whatever religions they follow, whatever your sexual orientations and political orientations, you will be able to have the same right to live, to be educated and to be as you are and not like other people would love you to be.