Senegal

My delegation is particularly pleased to convey to Mr. Jan Kavan its heartfelt congratulations and fervent hopes for success in the lofty and important task ahead of him. His well-deserved election to the presidency of the fifty-seventh session of the General Assembly is a fitting tribute to the spirit of the Czech people as well as to his outstanding intellectual and moral qualities. I am pleased to take this opportunity to say how much we appreciated the courtesy, the commitment and the competence of his predecessor, Mr. Han Seung-soo, who guided our discussions in such an outstanding manner. We express to him our sincere and deep gratitude for his many relevant initiatives, including working visits to West Africa, particularly to Senegal, which are testimony of friendship for my country and support for the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD). I should like also like to express once again to Secretary-General Kofi Annan our admiration for his steadfast determination in serving the ideals and causes of our Organization. Thanks to his wisdom and far- sightedness, the United Nations has found new vigour with which to meet the tremendous challenges confronting humankind. It is therefore fitting that our Organization which more than ever needs the widest support for its plans and projects for a better management of the affairs of our globalized world is gaining two new Members: Switzerland and, soon, East Timor. To the delegations of those two friendly countries, I would like to express Senegal's warmest congratulations and our conviction that their contribution will undoubtedly be enriching for our Organization, whose universal character will thereby be reinforced. It is precisely in the name of the principle of the universality of the United Nations that Senegal reiterates its fervent wish to see the Republic of China on Taiwan join the concert of nations and assume its full responsibilities in our Organization and its specialized agencies. Granting that request, following the good precedent of the World Trade Organization, would bring justice to the 23 million inhabitants of the Republic of China on Taiwan, who through their exemplary conduct on the world stage have already given proof of Taipei's attachment to the noble objectives of the San Francisco Charter. Last week, the United Nations and the international community commemorated the anniversary of the tragic events of 11 September 2001. We express once again our sincere sentiments of sympathy and compassion to the thousands of American and other families in mourning. Senegal, its head of State and its Government strongly reiterate their steadfast determination to fight against terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, whatever its motivations and whoever its perpetrators and sponsors. Senegal proclaims loudly and clearly that there is no reason or cause sufficiently just or sufficiently good that it could justify an act of terrorism against pregnant women and other innocent civilians. 23 The Dakar Declaration against Terrorism, adopted on 17 October 2001 at the initiative of President Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal, gives full expression to our fervent wish to strengthen regional and subregional cooperation in order to dismantle the menace of terrorist activities on our continent. Let us remember the heinous and unrepentant terrorist strikes against the African people in Kenya and Tanzania. Nor do we forget the heroic daily resistance of the Algerian people in the face of repeated assaults by killers blinded by their hatred and not by their faith in God, at least not in the God of love and compassion that we Muslims proudly call Allah. To that end, Senegal submitted some months ago to the African Union a draft additional protocol to the Convention on the Prevention and Combating of Terrorism of the Organization of African Unity and the African Union. The draft protocol aims to strengthen the Algiers Convention and to adapt it to the post-11- September context. Also, my delegation welcomes the fine initiative of the Commission of the African Union, which recently held in Algiers a high-level intergovernmental meeting on terrorism in Africa. In other words, we have the common responsibility to maintain and to strengthen the international mobilization against terrorist networks and their financing. My Government welcomes the excellent work already carried out by the Security Council Counter- Terrorism Committee pursuant to Security Council resolution 1373 (2001). Senegal encourages the Committee to pursue its efforts and requests the Working Group of the General Assembly's Sixth Committee to do everything to hasten the adoption of a comprehensive international convention against terrorism. It is a truism that the fight against terrorism is a part of the international community's struggle to promote international peace and security. That is the objective that over the past months has not escaped our Organization, which has strived to find lasting solutions to conflicts that destroy the social and economic fabric of numerous countries, especially in Africa. In that regard, Senegal keenly appreciates the determined commitment of the Security Council, which, more conscious than ever of its role of guarantor of international peace and security, has devoted a large portion of its work this year to conflicts and tensions afflicting the African continent. Among the numerous praiseworthy initiatives of the Security Council, I would like to mention the convening of special meetings devoted to the situation of Africa, brilliantly presided over by the Ministers for Foreign Affairs of Mauritius and Singapore during their respective presidencies. On behalf of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), of which Senegal currently holds the chairmanship, I would like to nurture the hope that the United Nations will stay the course in order to forever stave off violence and wars, which take a serious financial toll on the future of many African countries. I am thinking of Sierra Leone, where the current exemplary normalization of the political and economic situation has largely been facilitated by the holding of free, transparent, democratic and peaceful elections. It is urgent that the bells of peace, which have sounded in Freetown, also be heard in Monrovia, where the absence of political dialogue led the way to grave socio-economic instability, whose contagious effect could turn out to be disastrous for the Mano River Union area. Senegal, as Chairman of ECOWAS, is working tirelessly and hopes to be able to report to the Assembly on its many initiatives under way, which could very shortly lay the foundations of peace in Liberia. In Sierra Leone and Liberia, as in Guinea-Bissau, where the Government of President Kumba Yal· is attempting with courage and abnegation to lift the country out of a financial and economic crisis following a trying civil war, the international community has the duty to continue more steadfastly its valuable assistance. In that regard, I welcome the strong signal sent by the Security Council under the United States presidency to financial backers with respect to granting Guinea-Bissau substantial financial aid so that it can firmly return to the path of peace and prosperity. The interest in that neighbour of Senegal and in our subregion recalls the wise and timely decision to establish at Dakar an Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for West Africa. That Office should promote better coordination among the activities of the United Nations in our subregion and their greater impact on the ground. I am 24 pleased to sincerely congratulate Secretary-General Kofi Annan on that clear-sighted initiative. It goes without saying that the Office will enjoy the enthusiastic support and complete cooperation of the Government of Senegal. Allow me to recall the activities of President Abdoulaye Wade in benefit of the great African people of Madagascar. His personal and total involvement in mediating a solution to the Madagascar crisis has, as a great international statesman said, surely spared the people of that great island a drift towards a civil war of incalculable consequences. He and his African colleagues who have taken up that issue have shown the world that with the strong support of the international community Africans will prove that they are also and above all peacemakers. Elsewhere, beyond the African continent but so close to our hearts, we observe a growing danger in the Middle East. This year again, the world has witnessed unheard-of violence in the Palestinian territories, where the occupying military Power, Israel, has decidedly opted for State violence, which leads to concepts as dangerous as the so-called targeted assassinations and other preventive operations. On the Palestinian side, that situation has caused an increase in terrorist cells specialists in suicide belts groups that we unequivocally and resolutely condemn. That network has produced an erosion of trust between Israelis and Palestinians trust that must be restored as swiftly as possible through frank and constructive dialogue that leads to a just and lasting solution. In order to achieve that, it is imperative that Tel Aviv comply with the relevant Security Council resolutions in particular resolutions 242 (1967), 338 (1973) and 1397 (2002) and that it also adhere to the peace plan proposed by Saudi Arabia and to the initiatives of the Quartet, which set out the basic principles of land for peace and withdrawal for normalization. The international community, in particular the Security Council and the Quartet, has the critical duty to formulate a bold plan to realize the vision of two States within the 1967 borders and to hasten what Senegal has continued to call for in all international forums: the immediate convening of an international conference on Palestine, leading to a specific mechanism that would address political, economic and security issues and having as its starting point the creation of a sovereign Palestinian State side by side an Israeli State, living in peace and harmony with its neighbours. Over the past 12 months, the international scene has been dominated by the holding of three major conferences that were crucial events in humanity's collective march towards a more just and more unified world: the Fourth Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization, held at Doha, Qatar; the International Conference on Financing for Development, held at Monterrey, Mexico; and the World Summit on Sustainable Development, held at Johannesburg, South Africa. Those world conferences and the strong alliances that they created will allow humanity to enter the third millennium on a positive note. I should like to note here that, in the light of those statements of good intentions, the time for action has come. We must act swiftly so that globalization, a phenomenon that affects us all, will ultimately benefit us all. Up to now, despite its certain virtues, globalization seems to have caused greater marginalization of the vast majority of the peoples of the South. As a consequence, it is urgent that we identify innovative mechanisms of development financing. In fact, even if official development assistance is still valuable for the States of the South, its effectiveness will be limited without the addition of concrete measures such as access for products of the South to markets of the North, an increase in foreign direct investment flows to developing countries, particularly those in Africa, and the initiating role that, we must recognize, belongs to the international and African private sectors. Indeed, Senegal is convinced that no country in the world has ever developed through official development assistance. The private sector, infrastructure and education are universally acknowledged as the tripod of genuine sustainable development. It is no less urgent, following the much- appreciated appointment of a High Representative of the Secretary-General for the Least Developed Countries, that we all commit ourselves to implementing the Brussels Programme of Action, in conformity with the consensus of the 12th Ministerial Meeting of the Group of 49, held at Cotonou from 5 to 7 August 2002. The success of such initiatives cannot depend on Governments alone. We need to build firm partnerships with local communities, with civil society actors, with 25 the private sector, with non-governmental organizations and with international organizations. It is fitting that humanity's oldest continent should be proud of the adoption of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD), a double partnership internal and international and a linkage, on the one hand, among Africans and, on the other, between Africa and the rest of the international community, which has already shown its full support for that new initiative. As evidence, I cite the Group of Eight Africa Action Plan and the holding of the high-level plenary meeting of the General Assembly to consider how to support NEPAD. Through NEPAD, which has the merit of defining the prerequisites for African development, of identifying sectoral priorities and of developing a resource mobilization strategy, African leaders among them His Excellency Mr. Abdoulaye Wade, President of the Republic of Senegal intend to demonstrate that the responsibility for Africa's development is essentially theirs. In that context, I must mention the launching of the African Union in July at Durban, South Africa. We hope that its Peace and Security Council, coupled with NEPAD's Peer Review Mechanism, will lead to strong commitments by our heads of State, first for our people and then for our partners, which are very concerned by the central questions of good governance and conflict prevention and resolution. Our development concerns do not preclude our demands for human rights. That is why my country attaches great importance to the promotion and protection of the rights of women and children. At the initiative of the Government, a major programme is under way to combat, in particular, violence against women and the trafficking and exploitation of women and children for commercial and sexual purposes. In those areas, the strategy formulated and implemented by Senegal is based on action plans adopted at the special session of the General Assembly on Beijing +5 and on the follow-up to the World Summit on Children. As is its custom, Senegal wishes to honour and praise the great role of women in the world, in particular their African sisters, as the foundation and the powerful engine of African renewal. History will take note that it is Senegal that, through its President, has demanded and ensured that each of the five subregions of Africa elect at least one woman in its quota of two Commissioners to the Commission of the African Union. Africa is thus teaching the rest of the world a lesson in unprecedented parity, which is more proof if it were needed that, if we seek competent women, we will find them. At the initiative of its President, Senegal will organize, on 10 October at Dakar, a special summit of heads of State or Government of ECOWAS to follow up the results of the twenty-sixth special session of the General Assembly, devoted to children. The rights of women and children are integral elements of human rights, and my country reaffirms its attachment to the principles of the universality, interdependence and indivisibility of human rights, of good economic and political governance and of the rule of law. It is that democratic imperative that has prompted the head of State of Senegal to strengthen our institutional arsenal by creating the position of Commissioner of Human Rights, to which a woman has been appointed. As members are aware, Senegal was the first country in the world to ratify the Rome Statute for the establishment of the International Criminal Court (ICC), whose entry into force on 1 July 2002 my country welcomed. That commitment resulted in my Government's decision to present a candidate for judge on the ICC one of our finest magistrates and a specialist in criminal law. In conclusion, I should like, in recalling the urgency of confronting humanity's numerous challenges, to express the earnest hope that the Organization will bolster its ability to better serve the legitimate hopes of the world's peoples. Undoubtedly, that path will anchor the future of a world reconciled with itself, where justice, freedom, peace and prosperity will be jealously preserved in justice and freedom, in peace and prosperity, and in the dignity of human beings all human beings.