Thailand

At the outset, allow me to begin by congratulating you, Sir, on your election to the presidency of the General Assembly at its fifty-ninth session. The United Nations has long stood for the loftiest aspirations and the noblest causes of mankind. In times of strife, it is the United Nations that holds out the hope of harmony. In times of deprivation and suffering, it is the United Nations that holds out the hope of healing. After almost 60 years, however, this Organization, on which we pin so much hope, finds itself in the midst of an existential crisis. In a world ever more complex and less predictable, the United Nations has been struggling to redefine its meaning, identity and relevance for the era of globalization. To confront those new realities and more, no challenge will be greater than making the United Nations a more effective Organization for the times. No challenge will be greater than living up to the highest ideals of the United Nations with more action and fewer words. Our United Nations locomotive is powered by the commitment and good will of its Members. It can take us as far as we want to go, but only if we all pull together. It can take us at any speed, but only if the power of commitment and good will is fully energized. For whatever it is and for whatever it will be, the United Nations is the creation of its Members. So, in demanding more of the United Nations, we must also demand more of ourselves. And in asking the United Nations to do more, we must also be ready to be committed more. The task ahead of us all is to make sure that all concerted efforts are made nationally, regionally and globally to advance the causes the United Nations stands for and to restore total confidence in the working of multilateralism. Multilateralism cannot thrive or sustain without foundation. The foundation of the United Nations and its multilateralism may be its 191 Member States, but what bond binds the 191 Member States to the United Nations multilateral system? The world’s strategic, political and economic landscape of the twenty-first century is certainly far different, more complex and more intertwined than that of 1945. The layers of interwoven fibre that support such a multilateral institution as the United Nations must be modified and strengthened. It is Thailand’s belief that, given today’s international landscape, there is a greater need than ever to create new layers of regional and subregional building blocks to strengthen the United Nations multilateral foundation. Those building blocks are the bond that binds nations to the multilateral system. In so doing, those regional and subregional building blocks must bear the responsibility of supporting and advancing the United Nations goals on security and development: reducing poverty, combating international terrorism, fighting transnational crime, 16 promoting human dignity and human rights, and upholding the human race as a whole. In South-East Asia, the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) is to create its three-pillared community — the ASEAN Economic Community, the ASEAN Security Community and the ASEAN Socio- Cultural Community — by the year 2020. The realization of ASEAN communities, as in other regional or subregional communities, requires bridging the development gap. It was Thailand’s initiative to take on the role of building that bridge by introducing the Economic Cooperation Strategy — known as ACMECS — and thereby laying a faster track towards sustainable development for its neighbours: Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam. Through the creation of more jobs and the narrowing of the income gap, that strategy will serve as a building block for ASEAN’s three- pillared community. Further to the east, the ASEAN 10 are working with its East Asian friends to create the East Asian Community, comprising the ASEAN 10, China, Japan and the Republic of Korea. To the west, Thailand sees the need to connect south-east Asia’s development with its friends in South Asia. The first summit of the Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) — seven countries in South-East and South Asia around the Bay of Bengal — took place in Thailand in July, agreeing on a free trade area within the group which forms an economic and development bridge between the two subregions. These building blocks and that partnership are part and parcel of the firm foundation for the Asia Cooperation Dialogue (ACD), the first pan-Asian development forum. The ACD was initiated on the basis of Thailand’s conviction as to the virtue of partnership in drawing strength from diversity and in transforming diversity from a phenomenon that tears us apart to a force that unites us. With 25 member countries — countries from every part of Asia — and still growing, the two-and-a- half-year-old ACD will become an important building block for multilateral cooperation and the United Nations multilateral system. Through such building blocks, we can learn to live with one another’s differences and to cultivate a culture of peace and tolerance in order to counteract the violence and terror in today’s world. We cherish multilateralism as the best means to secure peace around the world. We cherish multilateralism as the best means to develop prosperity around the world. But above all, we cherish multilateralism as the best means to achieve both security and development worldwide. By the same token, State security and human security, which foster development, must always be two sides of the same coin. From Iraq to Saudi Arabia, from Indonesia to Russia, shocking acts of terror have been perpetrated, seemingly calculated to shake confidence and undermine hope. As civilized societies, we must come together to fight terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, wherever it may occur. Terrorism is a direct threat to State security, but it also undermines human security. That is why the development of human security and State security must proceed on parallel tracks. The world cannot be a secure place if its population is still suffering from poverty and deprivation. The world cannot really be peaceful if we cannot be successful in our efforts to make progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals. That is why Thailand believes in the enhancement of human security as a means of making the nation secure. Domestically, the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security is in charge of our policy and implementation. Internationally, we are active in the Human Security Network and in other international arenas in which human security issues are paramount. Thailand has long advocated balanced development, with freedom from fear and freedom from want as the two inseparable prongs of human security. We intend to continue to do so even more intensively as Thailand prepares to assume the chairmanship of the Human Security Network in 2005- 2006. We intend to further advocate such balanced development by embracing partnership between the Government and civil society. The Human Security Network statement issued in Thailand on the eve of the 15th International AIDS Conference in Bangkok last July — which was attended by more than 25,000 people and recognized 17 HIV/AIDS as an issue of both development and human security — clearly reflects development and security as interconnected. We view the issue of landmines in the same light. They are as much a humanitarian issue as a development one. As President of the Fifth Meeting of the States Parties to the Mine-Ban Convention, I have been working with the World Bank to reflect that approach in carrying out mine action. I am grateful for the Bank’s cooperation in realizing the development dimension of the landmine issue. I also appreciate the Bank’s readiness to mobilize resources for the training of deminers and capacity-building for survivors so that they may function as productive members of society. We are confident that the World Bank partnership will provide States parties to the Convention with greater resources that will help to achieve the Convention’s goal. As we try to secure peace for the world; as attempts are made to shatter our world’s peace and security with terror, fear, hatred and violence; as many struggle against poverty; and as we pledge our commitment to the Millennium Development Goals, the multilateral system that we need to rely upon is facing challenges and threats to its effectiveness of unprecedented a magnitude and proportion. However, amid those challenges, we are fortunate to see today nations building partnership with nations; nations learning to live with differences, and even turning differences and diversity into a common strength; and nations learning to achieve a higher level of tolerance, working at the economical, cultural and political levels to nurture a culture of peace and a culture of tolerance. Through building blocks like the ones Thailand has been initiating in Asia, throughout Africa, Latin America, Europe and elsewhere, and through South- South cooperation, a number of responsible nations are ready to make contributions, in their own way, to turn differences into cooperation and partnerships. Those partnerships and building blocks deal with security and development, the two defining principles of the United Nations. Those partnerships and building blocks can lay the foundation for a more effective functioning of the United Nations multilateral system — a system that needs redefining and redesigning to respond effectively to the new geosocial and political landscape of the world. Present-day realities — the emergence of building blocks, the inextricable linkage between development and security, and the need to develop human and State security on parallel tracks — clearly reflect how much the world has changed since 1945. That is why United Nations reform is not a question only of the effectiveness of any particular organ of the Organization. Nor is it merely a question of numbers or composition. It is fundamental, therefore, to ask some pertinent questions. How can the United Nations be made more responsive to current needs and realities, so that it devotes equal attention to the issues of security and development? What would be the best mechanism to deal adequately with issues of development and long- term global economic issues? What would be the best mechanism to deal adequately with post-conflict nation-building and reconstruction? What would be the best mechanism to ensure a greater participation of civil society, recognizing it as an important constituency for development and conflict resolution? How to ensure cooperation among the multilateral United Nations system and regional, subregional and interregional organizations, recognizing them as important building blocks for a more effective multilateralism? Security Council reform is needed. That much is not in doubt. But if expansion is needed, what realistic criteria are necessary for the expansion to reach greater effectiveness? Does it need to be more transparent? What are the roles and relationship among its members? Concerning the General Assembly, a body represented now by almost 200 Member States, more than three times larger than at the time of the founding of the United Nations, is it too cumbersome and do we remain content with its work process? How can the Assembly be streamlined, energized, and become more focused? Those are not all the questions asked, and Thailand is not the only one asking. But all of us will have to find the answers. While we are all entitled to different views, opinions, and analyses, ultimately the decision must be made by us, the Member States of the United Nations. 18 Reform of such a venerable institution is never easy. We have to be realistic about that. But we have faith in the far-sightedness and wisdom of United Nations Members to take a holistic view and choose the right path, even if it is the path less travelled. Thailand pledges to apply all our experiences in forging partnerships in order to play a responsible and constructive role in contributing to the United Nations reform process. We have supported the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change and will look forward to its report in December, as well as to the fruitful and constructive debate by all of us thereafter. Whether the United Nations recovers from its mid-life crisis or sinks into irrelevance is up to us, the Member States. For what it is and what it will become, the United Nations is our own creation made of our own commitment and goodwill. It is up to us to rise to the challenge. Only when nations are united, will we get the United Nations.