Fifty years ago. almost to the day. two German States joined the United Nations: the then German Democratic Republic, as the 133rd Member, and the Federal Republic of Germany, as the 134th Member. That step is of great importance to us Germans to this very day. for membership of the United Nations enabled my country — the instigator of terrible and horrific crimes — to return to the family of peace-loving nations. We are profoundly grateful for that chance.
That return was not free of requirements. The accession of the two German States was preceded by a visionary policy of detente. The aim. as my predecessor — Federal Chancellor and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Willy Brandt — said here in New York 50 years ago. was to “fill in the rifts left behind by the cold war” (A/PV.2128./mra. 9). Three things were essential for that.
The first was the clear commitment of both German States to resolve conflicts without force. That was laid down in the Basic Treaty between Bonn and East Berlin, as well as in the treaties that the Federal Republic of Germany concluded with its eastern neighbours.
The second prerequisite was the renunciation of any form of revisionism by recognizing Germany’s new borders, drawn after the Second World War. as inviolable. At the time, many people in West Germany were opposed to that. In retrospect, however, it proved to be the right decision.
Finally, the third prerequisite was a foreign policy that did not ignore the realities of the Cold War and that, at the same time, always remained focused on overcoming the status quo — that is to say. the confrontation between the blocs and thus also the unnatural division of Germany.
When I look back here today at the beginnings of our membership of the United Nations. I do so not only out of historical interest, but because the prohibition of the use of force remains the unfulfilled core pledge of our United Nations. That is because the inviolability of borders and the sovereign equality of States also have to be defended in our multipolar world by us all. and because we today — especially today — need the courage, creative energy and will to fill in the rifts, which are deeper than ever.
Germany is strongly committed to those three ideals: the renunciation of the use of force as a political instrument, the rejection of any kind of revisionism and the determination to engage in cooperation beyond any dividing factors. It is to those ideals that we Germans owe the great fortune of living in a unified country today, in peace with our neighbours, friends and partners around the world.
At the same time, what Willy Brandt stated here 50 years is all the more true today:
“In a world in which we are all increasingly dependent on each other, a policy for peace must not stop on our own doorstep” (ibid., para. 33).
German policy cannot and never will be limited to pursuing our interests with no consideration for others, because we know that our freedom, our democracy and our prosperity are deeply rooted in the well-being of Europe and the world.
That is why the order of the day is not less cooperation, sometimes packaged today as decoupling or as cooperation only among the like-minded. Instead, we need more cooperation. Existing alliances must be strengthened and partners sought, for that is the only way to reduce the risks of excessively one-sided dependencies. That is all the more true in a world which, in contrast to 50 years ago. no longer has only two centres of power. Rather, it has many.
Multipolarity is not a new order. Anyone who assumes that smaller countries are the backyards of larger ones is mistaken. Multipolarity is not a normative category but a description of today’s reality. Anyone seeking order in a multipolar world has to start here at the United Nations. That is why Germany supports the United Nations system and. as the second-largest contributor after the United States, pays its regular budget assessments with full conviction. Only the United Nations — on the basis of the values enshrined in its Charter — can fully realize the aspirations of universal representation and sovereign equality for all. That cannot be said of the Group of Seven, the Group of 20 (G-20) — as important as they are for achieving international consensus — the BRICS group of Brazil. Russian Federation. India. China and South Africa, or of other groups.
I know that some will counter by asking: Is the United Nations not all too often unable to take action, paralysed by the antagonisms of its heterogeneous membership? My response to them is that the obstruction of a few. no matter how influential they, should not lead us to forget that we. the overwhelming majority of States, agree on many things. All of us — almost all of us — want force as a political instrument to remain banned. All of us have an interest in ensuring that the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of our countries are respected. And all of us should know what that requires — namely, that we also grant those rights to others. Those golden rules are universal, even if many of us were not yet sitting around the table when the Charter of the United Nations was adopted in 1945.
Yet only 10 years later, in Bandung. Indonesia, it was the African and Asian States liberated from colonialism that raised their voices to call for self-determination, territorial integrity, the sovereign equality of all States and a world without colonialism and imperialism. That seems more relevant today than ever before. It is by those principles that we. whether large or small, will all be judged. Those principles must also form the basis when it comes to reshaping our multipolar world. Only then can the global challenges of our time be mastered.
The greatest challenge of all is anthropogenic climate change. Of course, the traditional industrialized countries have a very special responsibility in the fight against the climate crisis. However, many other countries are among the biggest emitters today. Instead of waiting for others, we all have to do more together to achieve the Paris climate goals. Each and every one of us must have the opportunity to gain the same level of prosperity as people in Europe. North America or countries such as Japan or Australia.
However, our planet will not survive if that economic development is attained with the technologies and production processes of the nineteenth or twentieth centuries — with combustion engines and coal-fired power plants. That leads us to one conclusion — we have to decouple economic development from carbon dioxide emissions. That is already happening in many countries, for we have the solutions and technologies.
As a key nation in the field of technology, we are offering to cooperate here for the common good. If producers of renewable energies and their industrial users come together across continents, we will create new prosperity together in many places around the world. I am pleased to announce today that Germany is honouring its pledges on international climate financing. From €2 billion in 2014 and more than €4 billion in 2020. we tripled our contribution last year to €6 billion. We have therefore kept our word, as will the industrialized countries as a whole, which will hit their target of €100 billion for international climate financing for the first time this year. That is an important and overdue signal before we take stock in Dubai this December and negotiate new climate action plans for the period after 2030.
I believe that it is important that we be as concrete and as binding as possible. That is why I advocate that we set clear targets in Dubai for the expansion of renewable energies and for greater energy efficiency. We will be equally ambitious when it comes to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Climate action or development — that trade-off will not work. Our Summit yesterday brought home to me how urgent it is that we make up for lost time when it comes to the SDGs. too. We therefore want to use next year’s Summit of the Future, which we are currently preparing with our friends from Namibia, to pick up the pace and push ahead with the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development It is important to me in that context that we ensure more private investment in Africa. Asia. Latin America and the Caribbean.
Let me offer just one example. The entire world is currently talking about the diversification of supply chains and raw materials security. Would it not be a start if at least the first production step were to take place on-site, where the raw material deposits are to be found? Certainly. Germany and German businesses are open to entering into partnerships of that very nature.
Of course, in the coming years we will all face the challenge of leading our economies. our energy supplies and our infrastructure to a resource-efficient, climate-neutral future. That will require major investment. To create the right conditions to bring about that investment, we have to address the debt crisis in many countries and modernize the international financial architecture. I said at the start that Germany is not clinging to the status quo. including on this issue either. We want something to change.
I have been calling — most recently at the G-20 Summit in Delhi — for the multilateral development banks to reform so that they can contribute more to financing the protection of global public goods such as the climate and biodiversity or the prevention of pandemics. That is what the G-20 decided in Delhi. Germany is also providing financial support for this reform. We will be the first country to invest hybrid capital, to the tune of €305 million, in the World Bank. It is estimated that this capital will enable the World Bank to provide more than €2 billion in additional loans.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has pointed to the rapidly increasing demand and humanitarian needs arising from the many crises worldwide. Germany is the second-largest donor of humanitarian assistance around the globe and will continue to stand by the people who need it most.
The United Nations itself must not cling to the status quo. and by that I mean two things. First, the United Nations must tackle the challenges of the future, just as Secretary-General Guterres has proposed. One of the major issues, in my view, is how we can ensure that innovation and technological advances are used by humankind as a whole. Artificial intelligence, for example, offers tremendous opportunities. At the same time, it can cement the division of the world if only a few benefit from it. if algorithms only take part of reality into account, or if access is limited to richer countries. That is why Germany is actively fostering exchange on the Global Digital Compact. We should also talk about common rules for the possible use of generative artificial intelligence as a weapon.
Another question that will define our future is how the United Nations itself represents the reality of a multipolar world. To date, it has not done so sufficiently. That is most evident in the composition of the Security Council. I am therefore delighted that a growing number of partners — including three permanent members — have stated that they want to see progress on reform.
However, one thing is clear. Africa deserves greater representation, as do Asia and Latin America. Under that premise, we can negotiate a text with various options. No country should obstruct those open-ended negotiations with excessively high demands. Germany will not do so either. Ultimately, it is up to the General Assembly to decide on a reform of the Security Council. Until then. Germany would like to shoulder responsibility as a non-permanent member of the Security Council, and I ask members to support our candidacy for 2027-2028.
When I speak of peace these days before the Assembly, my thoughts are with those for whom peace is a distant dream. My thoughts are with the Sudanese, who have become victims of a brutal power struggle between two warlords, and with the men and women in Eastern Congo and. as we speak, the people of Nagorno-Karabakh, where resumed military activities will lead only to a dead end and must come to a halt. Of course, my thoughts are with the Ukrainians, who are fighting for their lives and their freedom, for independence and their country’s territorial integrity in order to safeguard those very principles to which we have all committed ourselves in the United Nations Charter.
But Russia’s war of aggression has caused immense suffering not only in Ukraine. People around the world are suffering as a result of inflation, growing debts, the scarcity of fertilizer, hunger and increasing poverty. Precisely because the war is having unbearable consequences around the world, it is right and proper that the world be involved in the quest for peace. At the same time, we should beware of phoney solutions that represent peace in name only, for peace without freedom is called oppression. Peace without justice is called dictatorship.
Moscow, too. must finally understand that, for let us not forget that Russia is responsible for this war. and it is Russia’s President who can end it at any time with one single order. But if he is to do so. he has to understand that we. the States of the United Nations, are serious about our principles and that in the multipolar world of the twenty- first century, we do not see a place for revisionism and imperialism. No one here in New York has expressed that as aptly as our colleague, the Ambassador of Kenya. After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, he said this in the Security Council:
“Rather than form nations that looked ever backwards into history with a dangerous nostalgia, we chose to look forward to a greatness that none of our many nations and peoples had ever known.” (S/PV.8970, />. 8)
Germany’s history holds many lessons about the dangers of such nostalgia. That is why we chose a different path when we joined the United Nations 50 years ago — the path of peace and reconciliation, the path of recognizing existing borders, the path of cooperation with all in the pursuit of a better and more equitable world. It started with a solemn promise that we made 50 years ago. a promise every one of us made upon joining the United Nations — to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security. Let us all do our best to live up to that promise.