With reverence and an immense sense of responsibility,
I come to this historic forum for the first time to
reiterate the commitment of my country and more than
45 million Colombians to the fulfilment and success of
the founding principles of the United Nations. As this
Organization proceeds in its reform process, we
support its adoption of the criteria of good governance,
efficiency and transparency in order to realize those
principles and to achieve a more effective international
system of cooperation.
We believe that the United Nations should focus
on achieving concrete results that transform realities
rather than deepen conditions of dependency or
perpetuate assistance programmes that often do more
harm than good in developing countries. It is in this
belief and with faith in the future of the Organization
that I express today before this Assembly my country’s
aspiration to become a member of the Security Council
for the period 2011-2012. We seek that position on the
basis of respect for the principles of the United Nations
Charter and with the commitment to providing our
fullest cooperation to the maintenance of international
peace and security.
Colombia — which, along with other Latin
American nations, commemorates its two-hundredth
year of independence this year — has a long and
successful democratic and institutional tradition. Our
Republic has suffered the attacks of terrorism and the
ravages of international crime, but we have always
faced them within the framework of our Constitution
and laws, following the most rigorous democratic
procedures. We are confident that our long and painful
experience can be very useful to all States Members of
the Organization in matters in which we have
developed a strong technical and operational capacity,
such as security, the struggle against terrorism and
drug trafficking, the fight against the illicit trade in
small arms and light weapons, the progressive
eradication of anti-personnel mines, humanitarian
assistance, the disarmament, demobilization and
reintegration of illegal armed groups, and — of
particular importance — how to do so while always
protecting human rights.
As advocates of peaceful coexistence, we
Colombians are proud to participate in peacekeeping
and peacebuilding operations, such as the United
Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti, the
Multinational Force and Observers in Sinai, and the
United Nations Integrated Peacebuilding Office in
Sierra Leone. This participation reflects our
commitment to peace anywhere in the world, which we
reaffirm today.
That is why we want to be the voice of Latin
America and the Caribbean in the Security Council at
this very special moment for our region. Latin America
and the Caribbean, a region of some 600 million
inhabitants, is our area of natural interaction. The
region includes countries with multiple political
visions and diverse positions on many specific topics.
But we are united in the interest of overcoming
poverty, improving the living standards of our people,
integrating ourselves successfully into the global
market, and protecting our environment.
Latin American nations are beginning to assume a
global leadership role on economic, environmental,
security and development issues. In my inaugural
speech on 7 August, I said that, given the significant
progress achieved by my country, the time for
Colombia had come. Today, in this global forum, I
wish to go further and state with absolute conviction
that the time has come for Latin America.
We Latin Americans have assumed the
management of our economies with responsibility. As a
result, we were one of the regions least affected by the
global economic crisis. Today, our countries are
growing on the basis of economic, social and
technological pillars that are stronger than ever and
attracting investors from throughout the world. We are
a subcontinent where the majority of the population is
young, with immense talents and ability to work, with
cities and natural wonders that attract tourists and
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investors from all over the world, and with
unparalleled environmental wealth.
In these times, when the world demands food,
water, biofuels and natural lungs for the Earth such as
the tropical forests, Latin America has millions of
hectares ready for cultivation without affecting the
ecological balance, and all the willingness necessary to
become a supplier of all the goods that humanity needs
for its own survival.
More than 925 million people living with hunger
and malnutrition are a challenge that cannot be
postponed. Latin America can and wants to be part of
the solution. Ours is the region richest in biodiversity
on the planet, with the most megadiverse country in the
world, namely Brazil, and the country with the greatest
biodiversity per square kilometre, namely our country,
Colombia. The Amazon region alone holds 20 per cent
of the global supply of fresh water and 50 per cent of
the planet’s biodiversity.
Colombia is not a country with high levels of
polluting emissions, but we want to assume our
responsibility to the planet and its future. We therefore
support the international initiative known as Reducing
Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation,
which seeks to generate and allocate the resources
necessary to reduce tropical forest loss and associated
emissions. We Colombians want to be a model country
for the world in monitoring its forests, carbon
emissions and the state of its biodiversity.
Latin America as a whole must be a key region in
saving the planet. We call for a new agreement to
replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012, to
ensure the commitment of all — starting with the big
industrial Powers to emissions reduction. With
appropriate economic compensation, we have an
enormous capacity to reduce deforestation and plant
new forests, changing the history not only of the region
but of the world as a whole.
When the twenty-first century began, Latin
America and the Caribbean were just starting their
march towards integration into the global economy.
Today, 10 years later, in the light of our political and
economic stability and agricultural, energy and
environmental potential, I want to send a message to
the other nations of our region. The world’s eyes are
upon us. Now is the time for us to open our own eyes,
to overcome any persisting differences among us, and
to think big. If we do so, and given everything I have
just said, we can declare with one voice, as I do today
at the dawn of the second decade of the third
millennium: This is Latin America’s decade. It will be
a decade in which we can grow and advance, and first
and foremost in which we can serve our peoples and
the well-being of humankind.
Two days ago, I had the opportunity to present
Colombia’s results in its progress towards the
achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. I
am not now going to repeat our achievements — which
have been many — or our remaining challenges, which
are many more. I simply want to underline that, more
than any other problem, poverty, with all its related
consequences, is the greatest calamity in our world.
I want to call attention in particular to the twofold
tragedy faced by a brother Caribbean country, which,
along with its endemic poverty, is coping with the
effects of a devastating natural disaster. I was in Haiti a
couple of months ago and I must say, before this
Assembly of the nations of the world and with a
saddened heart, that its unbearable reality surpasses the
worst nightmare. The pledged international aid is yet to
arrive in its entirety, or at least it is not visible.
Haitians are still fighting and surviving with dignity
and courage, but without the due attention we must
give to their situation, which can bear no delay. I call
on the Security Council to consider transforming the
United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti into a
true development operation that responds to Haiti’s
needs and achieves concrete results.
In these difficult economic times, especially for
industrialized nations, with high unemployment and
stagnation, global solidarity tends to vanish from
among our priorities. That is a mistake. Turning one’s
back on international cooperation and trade helps no
one, and we are convinced that selfishness harms
everyone, and the industrialized world more than any.
Where else are consumers going to come from if not
from the millions of poor who have until now been left
at the margins of progress? Who, other than societies
filled with enthusiastic young people, can contribute to
the dynamism that mature nations need? What
economic space, other than the developing world, is
available to satisfy the needs of humankind in the
coming decades? Collective prosperity has advanced
the most precisely when millions have been involved in
development, and the darkest moments of our planet’s
economy have been those of exclusion and barriers.
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I cannot close without referring to two global
scourges — terrorism and drug trafficking — that feed
off each other, because it is often the money from illicit
drugs that finances terrorists acts and groups. Perhaps
more than any other country, Colombia has been a
victim of these phenomena, but it has also been a
model in the fight against them and a champion of the
need to act together with the international community,
under the principle of shared responsibility.
Our democratic security policy — a policy of
security for all with respect for the law — is also a
human rights policy because we have been able to
dramatically reduce the crimes and behaviours that
most threaten the lives and fundamental rights of our
people, such as homicide, kidnapping and
displacement. We were the first country to
comprehensively apply the principles of truth, justice
and reparation in the demobilization of illegal armed
groups. The Colombian State and society are
committed to defending and promoting human rights.
We do so out of conviction — deep conviction — and
not by imposition.
We have achieved great results in the fight
against drug trafficking. There has been a substantial
reduction in hectares where coca is grown, and we are
committed to pursuing this task until those crops are
completely eradicated. We have hit hard the mafias that
control this business, including guerrilla groups that
have become veritable drug cartels. We will continue to
fight them relentlessly and without quarter. We will
spare no effort. Just yesterday, from this very city, I
announced to the world the news of the death of the
highest-ranking military leader of the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Colombia in an operation impeccably
conducted by our armed forces. This is the most
important and decisive blow against that terrorist group
in its history, and we hope it will bring us closer to
peace.
We want to achieve peace either by reason or by
force, and we will achieve it so that we can dedicate
and focus all our energies on achieving development
and prosperity for our people. In the fight against drug
trafficking, we have lost many of our best soldiers,
policemen, leaders, judges and journalists. Still, their
blood has not been shed in vain. From a failed State in
which violent actors, financed by drug trafficking, had
distorted our democracy, today we look at the world
from a thriving democracy rising towards democratic
prosperity for all. We defeated the big drug cartels, but
this business has not come to an end yet. That is why
we will keep on fighting it, because for us it is a matter
of national security.
We are concerned and distressed that our relative
success has led to other countries of the region
suffering the growing presence and activities of drug
trafficking in their territories. The world needs to open
its eyes, because to be in denial with respect to this
problem could be fatal. It happened to us at a very high
cost.
We Colombians are more than willing to
cooperate with States that need it, and we are already
doing so with several countries in Central America and
the Caribbean, with Mexico and even in Afghanistan.
But, it is very important that we be consistent on this
issue. I say this as representative of the country with
the highest moral authority to speak of this scourge,
because no other nation has suffered like ours the
disastrous consequences of drug trafficking.
We note with concern the contradictory stance of
some countries that, on the one hand, demand a head-
on fight against drug trafficking and, on the other,
legalize consumption or study the possibility of
legalizing the production and trade of certain illicit
drugs. How can I or anyone tell a peasant in my
country that he or she will be prosecuted and punished
for growing crops for drug production, while in other
countries such activity is being legalized? These
contradictions make it urgent — and on this matter we
join the call by President Leonel Fernández Reyna of
the Dominican Republic — that we agree to review the
global strategy against illicit drugs in order to draft a
single global policy that is more effective and within
which all countries will contribute equally to this
effort.
Thanks to the significant security, economic and
social achievements accomplished in recent years
through the efforts of many Colombians and the
leadership of my predecessor, President Álvaro Uribe,
today Colombia finds itself at the dawn of a new
morning. I came to office with the commitment to fight
poverty and unemployment and to lead my country
towards not only economic but also social prosperity
that reaches everyone, above all the poorest. I have
proposed a Government of national unity in which all
Colombians are united to create jobs and greater
welfare. I foresee with great optimism our future as a
nation.
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Today, I present myself before this global forum
with respect, humility, a sense of history and an
awareness of our own limitations to say that we can do
nothing alone, neither in my country nor in the world.
Only united and only with respect, solidarity and
tolerance will humankind be able to know a better
tomorrow.