Poland

The agenda of this session not only is full of importance and burning issues but also brings great hopes and expectations. In his statement, Mr. Bernard Bot, the Foreign Minister of the Netherlands, presented the European Union’s position on the most important problems. That statement fully reflects our thinking and concerns. One issue, however, that deserves our special attention today is the reform of the United Nations. The present session of the General Assembly must be remembered as a session of reform. It should lay the foundations for a profound and consensus-based reflection on the relevance and the effectiveness of the United Nations. This reflection should result in bold and imaginative decisions providing for a substantial overhaul of the Organization. That is how we in Poland see the preparations for the major event of 2005, which will undertake a comprehensive review of the implementation of the Millennium Declaration Goals and mark the sixtieth anniversary of the United Nations. As Secretary-General Kofi Annan noted, the United Nations is at a fork in the road. It is time to act. Every year, at the annual general debate of the General Assembly, we take the floor to express our views — sometimes very critical — on the work of the Organization. However, there is little evidence that these debates have had any significant impact on the future of the United Nations. Indeed, over the past years, the United Nations has seen many celebratory and majestic gatherings. Unless we are able to build a political consensus and work out efficient, forward-looking and workable decisions, we should cut down on high-level ceremonies. 46 Poland has frequently voiced its conviction that we have to carry out a comprehensive, strategic review of the role of the United Nations in both its normative and institutional aspects. It was with this in mind that, on behalf of my country two years ago, I had the privilege of putting forward the idea of a new political act for the United Nations. We are pleased to see that, two years later, that belief and determination are widely shared. Bearing in mind the unique momentum for reform, we look forward to the recommendations of the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change. They should provide the critical mass for the reform efforts and form a solid basis for further actions. In that context, I express my gratitude to the members of the Panel, who came to Warsaw in May this year to consult with representatives of our part of Europe on the most important conceptual aspects of the reform. The Warsaw Regional Conference was a rewarding experience. The report issued following the conference has been made available to all delegations at the Assembly. We have never had any problem with ideas, excellent proposals and promising initiatives. The biggest obstacle to reform, rather, has been the lack of political consensus. The reform cannot be effective if it reflects the ideas of small groups of specialists or politicians alone. It must rely on a broad consensus and reflect a shared community of values and a sense of identity and purpose. Building that consensus is our major, common task. The reform of the United Nations has to go beyond institutional aspects, but we recognize the fact that institutions are important. Therefore, any reform package lacking ideas for reforming the organs of the United Nations would be considered inadequate by the majority of Member States. Poland shares the common opinion that it is hard to imagine strengthening the role of the Security Council without increasing its legitimacy. Today’s discussions on Council reform are focused mainly on expanding its membership. However, the key to a more effective and legitimate Security Council does not lie in the number of its members. A Council of 24 members would probably have no more powerful a voice than a Council of 15. However, at the present stage of discussions, we agree that the Security Council has to be expanded. One of the deficiencies of the United Nations, as it transpires from the conceptual discussions, is that there is too great a gap between the functions of mandating and implementing. Therefore, we believe that it is the responsibility of the members of the Security Council to take the lead in providing political and material support for implementation of Security Council mandates. Security Council reform should be based on the assumption that membership on the Council not only confers additional privileges but also brings additional responsibilities. The reform should preserve the inherent balance among the various organs of the United Nations. While we support the tendency to expect more from the Security Council, any reform should be accompanied by a more effective role for the General Assembly. The two bodies should be seen as mutually supportive and reinforcing organs. However, in order to use the potential of the General Assembly effectively and optimize its performance, we must profoundly change the way we speak to one another in this forum. This must be a forum of dialogue. Occasionally, one hears jokes along the lines that the General Assembly is a place where everybody speaks but nobody listens. We have to change that. We must start talking to one another more directly, more candidly. Let me assure the President, as we congratulate him on the assumption of his post, that Poland will support all his efforts in that regard. We need to enhance the performance of the bodies of the United Nations in social and economic development and the environment, as well as in other, related, no less pressing areas. There is a real danger that the Millennium Development Goals will not be fulfilled. That would deliver a serious blow to the credibility of the United Nations. Given that the distinction between socio-economic and political issues is becoming increasingly blurred, we need a unified approach. However, the existing efforts are often too fragmented, uncoordinated, and even contradictory and self-paralytic. In this context, the role of the Economic and Social Council and its reform should be strictly linked with other United Nations bodies. In order to be comprehensive, the reform cannot stop at its institutional dimension. We need to revisit the nature of current security challenges that expose the deficiencies and shortcomings of our Organization 47 in the most systematic way. Predictable threats caused in the past by wars between countries have been replaced by indefinite and unpredictable threats caused by international terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), and an increasing number of States in distress, whose Governments are unable to exercise effective power over their territory and population. As a consequence, we are facing an unprecedented spread of terrorist acts and violence. In this context, on behalf of the people of Poland and myself, I express our deepest condolences to the relatives of the victims of the recent events in Beslan. We condemn this barbaric act and offer our solidarity with the victims. To cope properly and successfully with the new nature of threats and challenges, it is necessary to use this opportunity to examine the functional and conceptual basis of the Organization. Therefore, Poland advocates that the important part of the reform should be re-examination of the conceptual foundations of the United Nations. In today’s world, new threats cast a new light on the concepts that we use to regulate the international order. Principles such as non-use of force, sovereignty, legitimacy, accountability for both States and their leaders, subsidiarity, complementarity, solidarity and responsibility still occupy the highest level of importance. What we need is their adjustment to the current reality, new political guidelines on how we, and how Security Council members in particular, should translate them into action. Among these concepts, the principle of solidarity, is for us more than just assisting the poor and underdeveloped. Solidarity is an operational principle that should generate cooperative attitudes for countries in need, including those plagued by terrorism, natural and man-made disasters and calamities, weak State structures, and so forth. One of the most important issues, in the light of the particularly threatening nexus of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction, is the principle of the non-use of force. The following aspects should be examined: anticipatory self-defence, humanitarian intervention and collective use of force with authorization by the Security Council. In this respect, we need a code of conduct that will give us sufficient predictability as to how we, as Members of the United Nations, will act on the international scene when employing the United Nations as our instrument of choice and how we will make the best use of its potential. We also hope that the reform will strengthen the role of the United Nations as a community of values. The United Nations was born to unite its Members against threats and enemies. Today, it should unite us for positive change in the consolidation of values, such as human rights, democracy, social justice, and development, which constitute the backbone and moral foundation of humankind. When preparing future decisions, we should discuss not only the content but also the form. Poland believes that the best approach to this is to have a political document that would both spell out the reinforced message about the role, principles and values, and also contain the necessary institutional adjustments. We most definitely regard this document as something more than a set of amendments to the United Nations Charter. We have to completely change the way we perceive the United Nations. For many years, most of our countries have been asking themselves what they can get from the Organization. Today, it is time for all of us to secure the future of the United Nations.