At the outset, Sir, I wish to congratulate you on
your election as President of the Genera]
Assembly of the thirty-seventh session. My
delegation is pleased to see you direct the
proceedings of the General Assembly, because you
represent a friendly country with which my
country maintains very close relations, and also
because of your wisdom, experience and ability,
which qualify you to shoulder that responsibility
and make it likely that you will achieve the best
of results. I should like also to pay a tribute
and to express my thanks to your predecessor, Mr.
Ismat Kittani, head of the fraternal delegation
of Iraq, for the excellent manner in which he
directed the proceedings of the General Assembly
during the last session, and the great ability he
displayed. It is also my pleasure to commend the
efforts being made by the Secretary-General to
strengthen the role of the Organization and to
increase its efficiency.
1. Sir, you have assumed the presidency of
the General Assembly at a most difficult time, a
time of increasing dangers and proliferating
hotbeds of tension, and of problems causing
instability in international peace and security.
It is a time when the world's peoples, especially
the smaller ones, are concerned for their
destiny and their freedom. We note that the
clatter of weapons is louder than the voice of
reason, that right has become has become the
prerogative of the strong and that the capability
of the United Nations has sunk to an
unprecedented tow. Disappointment at that was
ctearly expressed by the Secretary-General in his
report on the work of the Organization, in which
he said that
The United Nations itself has been unable to
play as effective and decisive a role as the
Charter certainty envisaged for it.
... The Security Council, the primary organ of
the United Nations for the maintenance of
international peace and security, all too often
finds itself unable to take decisive action to
resolve international conflicts and its
recommendations are increasingly defied or
ignored by those that feel themselves strong
enough to do so
2. The Socialist People's Libyan Arab
Jamahiriya shares the Secretary-General's views
in this regard. I should like in this context to
recall the letter sent by the Leader of the
Revolution, brother Colonel Muammar Qaddafi, to
the Secretary-General on 20 September 1982 in the
wake of the massacre of Palestinians in Beirut at
the hands of Israel and its agents:
I regret to have to express to you and to the
world the bitter truth which I perceive in my
country, namely, that the second historic attempt
made by the peoples in 1943 (in San Francisco) to
establish an international organization to
prevent war and keep the peace has failed
utterly, as did the first attempt (i.e., the
League of Nations).
4. We have, however, the right to ask: where does
the responsibility for the inability of the
United Nations lie? Is it the responsibility of
the States Members of the United Nations? Or is
it the responsibility of the developing countries
which are systematical subjected to military
threat, economic blockade and political blackmail?
3. The responsibility, as we see it, lies in the
structure of the main organ of the Organization.
It is the Security Council which has become an
instrument to protect dictatorship for the
benefit of the permanent members of the Security
Council. Responsibility also lies in the abuse of
the right of veto by States members of the
Security Council in a manner that has made the
Council a vehicle for their own security,
encouraging the aggressive policies pursued by
their agents. The unlimited number of times that
the United States Administration has used the
right of veto to prevent the Council from
condemning the Zionist entity's aggressive acts
in the Arab region is clear evidence of the
policy of injustice being practiced under the
umbrella of the United Nations and the Security
Council. The reason for the inability of the
Organization lies also in the fact that the
right of veto that the members of the cub of
victors in the Second World War granted to
themselves was abused for the benefit of those
victors to maintain their balance of interests.
In their irresponsible exercise of the right of
veto, they turn the standard of democracy upside
down and subject the will of more than 130 States
Members of the Organization to the mercy of the
permanent members of the Security Council.
6. The Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya,
after consulting a target number of Member
States, put forward a number of proposals to
abolish or amend the veto or to give greater
power to the General Assembly and make binding
its resolutions adopted by a two-thirds majority.
These proposals, however, met with rejection by
the great Powers which exercised pressure on
other, smaller countries to prevent the abolition
or amendment of the right of veto and to oppose
the principles of democracy and collective
responsibility for the maintenance of peace and
against the principle of equal sovereignty among
ail Member States, as provided for by the Charter.
7. The Libyan Arab Jamahiriya still holds
that view and will continue to bring up the
subject as long as the veto continues to exist
and continues to be used against the struggles of
peoples. It represents dictatorship and
monopoly, and is contrary to the opinion of the
majority in favor of collective responsibility
and equality. We shall continue to hold these
views, regardless of the stand taken by the great
Powers, particularly the United States, which
most abuses its use of the veto, and without
regard to procedural manoeuvres to which they
have recourse.
8. The time has come to look seriously into
the role of the Special Committee on the Charter
of the United Nations and on the Strengthening of
the Role of the Organization, because the
oppressed peoples of the world have almost lost
faith in the United Nations. We in the Libyan
Arab Jamahiriya realize the dangers that would
result from a loss of faith in our Organization.
That is why the leader of the great September
revolution made an appeal to enable the
Organization to fulfill its role in maintaining
peace and justice, because the dictatorial
practices carried out under its umbrella may
compel us to leave it and to urge other oppressed
peoples to seek their own special platform from
which to express their will and ambitions.
9. The abolition of the right of veto or its
review, if viewed as a guarantee of democratic
practices, could enable the developing peoples to
regain their faith in the United Nations. My
country believes that, in reviewing the veto, the
following aspects should be taken into
consideration: first, the abolition of the veto
or its amendment which would allow its use by all
members, because if political dictatorship is to
be practiced, then it is only fair that it be
practiced by all; secondly, the Security Council
must be placed under the General Assembly, and
not the other way round, because in the General
Assembly resides the true will of the peoples and
nations of the world; and thirdly, the
maintenance of international peace and security
is the collective responsibility of all.
10. The agenda of the current session of the
General Assembly is full of political and
economic issues, in addition to those of
liberation and colonialism. 1 shall allude to
those problems.
11. The recent massacres committed by the
Zionist entity in Palestinian refugee camps in
Lebanon is evidence of the tragedy that has
befallen the cause of the just struggle of the
Palestinian people, and demonstrates the
aggressive, Fascist and racist nature of the
so-called State of Israel. It confirms beyond
doubt that the State of the Zionist entity is not
peace-loving and is a source of threat to
international peace and security.
12. The continued occupation of the
Palestinian territories since 1948, the
annexation of the Golan Heights and the massacres
committed daily against the Palestinians and
Lebanese, must induce the international
community represented in the United Nations to
take practical measures to eliminate aggression
and occupation and to enable the Palestinian
people to return to its homeland.
13. The practical measures envisaged by my
country are as follows: first, the expulsion of
the Zionist entity from the General Assembly, on
the grounds that the Israelis and their State are
not peace-loving, and in accordance with the
resolutions adopted by the General Assembly at
its ninth emergency special session, at which it
debated Israel's repeated aggression against the
Arab territories; secondly, the halting of
military, material and political support provided
by the United States Administration, which
exceeds $10 million daily, because we see that
support as encouragement for Israel to continue
its constant aggression against the Arabs and its
challenge to the resolutions of the international
community; thirdly, the economic boycott of the
Zionist entity in implementation of the
resolutions of the General Assembly, on the
grounds that Israel is occupying Arab territories
by force, and because of its disregard of the
resolutions of the international community. If
some were able to impose an economic boycott on
Argentina for demanding territories that belong
to it, one wonders how it is that an economic
boycott is not imposed on a Member of the United
Nations that all have admitted is not
peace-loving and is a threat to international
peace and securityóand by that I mean Israel;
fourthly, the halt of immigration, particularly
that coming to occupied Palestine from Eastern
bloc countries, because the immigrants are
primarily citizens of those countries, and
because their continued influx into occupied
Palestine represents an increase in Israel's
human and military capacity to continue to
exercise a policy of aggression and occupation.
14. The political solutions proposed for the
Palestine question come at a time when the United
Nations is apparently unable to check Israeli
intransigence. That is in addition to the
inability of the Organization to stand against
support of the American Government for Israel's
aggressive policies. We therefore not see in the
initiatives undertaken by the United States
Administration a valid basis for any just peace.
13. The United States peace initiative ignores
the resolutions of the United Nations, the
Organization of African Unity and the group of
non-aligned countries, which affirm the right of
the Palestinian people to determine their own
destiny and establish their own independent State
under the leadership of the Palestine Liberation
Organization [PLO], their legitimate and sole
representative. Furthermore, the peace initiative
put forward by the Twelfth Arab Summit
Conference, held at Fez, is too optimistic; it
has much good will but does not recognize the
true nature of the Zionist entity. It runs
counter to the following logical facts.
16. History has taught us that the occupier,
the aggressor, is the one that puts forward
political initiatives to those under its
occupation. The only initiative that can be put
forward by a colonized people is armed struggle.
On what logic should the Arabs come up with peace
initiatives when the American people, with French
assistance, confronted British colonialism and
Europe confronted Nazi occupation in defense of
peace and freedom?
17. The Security Council must guarantee the
security of all States in the region and that
assumes two things, namely: that Israel is
threatened by its Arab neighborsówhich is
contrary to the truth, for Israel is the constant
aggressor that threatens Arab security, and,
furthermore, Israel's security and its policy of
aggression are guaranteed by the United States
militarily and financially; and that the Arab
peace plan would have the Security Council
guarantee the security of all States in the
region. That represents recognition of Israel. We
wonder how we can ask for protection and
recognition of a State the established political
schemes of which include the occupation of Arab
territories and the policy of genocide and
displacement pursued by it against the Arab
peoples in Palestine and Lebanon.
18. Any real peace initiative must come through
the United Nations, in spite of its weakness.
Peace initiatives now coming from the Arabs are
taken under the pressure of an Israeli force
supported by the United States and under the
United States threat to and blackmail of the
Arabs.
19. The present Government of the United
States of America is increasing its acts of
intervention and pressure for the purpose of
achieving political, economic and military
hegemony. It has gone back to the policy of
installing military bases in many parts of the
world. It has used its war fleets to practice
terrorism along the shores of non-aligned
countries, as it did in August 1981 to my
country, thereby violating our sovereignty over
our territorial waters. The last act of
aggression was on 3 September 1982, when a United
States aircraft violated our airspace at 7.59
p.m. It was an unmanned reconnaissance aircraft.
Our air defenses downed it in the Benghazi area,
and the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya will submit the
documents and facts on this aggression to the
President of the Security Council and to the
Secretary- General.
20. Also, in August 1981 the American
Government launched a propaganda campaign of
falsehoods and imposed an economic embargo
against Libya. It started to incite other
countries to follow its example on false
pretexts, such as the alleged sending of a death
squad to assassinate President Reaganówhich
proved to be only the product of the imagination
of certain officials in the United States
Administration in collaboration with the Zionist
intelligence service.
21. The United States Administration's
practice of threatening the Caribbean countries
and its attempts to prevent them from exercising
their free will prove the imperialist nature of
the United States Administration. The aggressive
policies pursued by that Administration against
Cuba, Nicaragua, Grenada and the people of El
Salvador are examples of the United States
policy, the aim of which is to create hotbeds of
tension and instability in the world,
particularly in the Middle East and southern
Africa.
22. The issues of disarmament and the
strengthening of international security are among
the most serious and complicated matters facing
our world today. They have been at the centre of
attention for the international community for
many years. This attention has been reflected in
the convening of numerous conferences since
1932, in particular the two special sessions of
the General Assembly devoted to disarmament, the
first in 1978 and the second this year, and also
in the resolutions adopted in this regard.
However, we see no signs on the horizon that
progress in this respect is being achieved. On
the contrary, the arms race has continued,
especially between the superpowers in the nuclear
field, with the development of new weapons
systems, such as the neutron bomb, and the
continued promotion of certain dangerous
theories, such as those of nuclear deterrence,
strategic balance and a limited nuclear war that
can be won, as well as the horizontal
proliferation of nuclear weapons, not to mention
the reported and manifest acquisition of nuclear
weapons by the racist regimes of the Zionist
entity and Pretoria.
23. The issue of disarmament is not just a
military one; it is also an economic, social and
political issue. In the study carried out by the
United Nations entitled the relationship between
disarmament and development it is stated that
1,500 million people do not have access to
effective medical services, nearly 570 million
suffer from severe malnutrition, 800 million are
illiterate and 250 million children do not attend
school. This was at a time, 1981, when the world
expenditure for military purposes exceeded $600
billion.
24. In addition to these negative
developments in the field of disarmament, in
recent years we have witnessed a deterioration in
international relations as a result of the
violation of the Charter and international
principles, in particular those relating to the
right to sovereignty, independence,
non-intervention and the non-use of force in
international relations and the continued spread
of the areas of war and hotbeds of tension.
25. In the African continent the policy of
apartheid pursued by the racist regime in South
Africa continues unabated in spite of the
frequent condemnation by the Organization, which
considers it a crime against humanity. However,
because of the assistance given to that regime by
the colonialists, especially the United States,
this abhorrent policy continues to be practiced
against African nationalists.
26. In Namibia the Pretoria regime continues,
through its illegal administration, to oppress
the black citizens and plunder the resources of
that Territory, in collaboration with
multinational corporations of Western countries
which have impeded the implementation of
Security Council resolution 435 (1978), which
contains a plan for the independence of the
Territory. In this connection, the role of the
Europeans is complementary to that of the
Americans in trying to achieve independence for
Namibia in accordance with Western schemes which
hav6 nothing to do with Security Council
resolutions. One of the latest obstacles created
by the United States Administration was the
linking of the subject of Namibia's independence
to the evacuation of Cuban forces from Angola,
which amounts to interference in the affairs of
an independent sovereign State, which has the
right to protect itself and seek help from any
State as it sees fit.
27. The aggressive and racist practices of
the Pretoria regime are not directed against the
black citizens of Namibia and South Africa only;
they have been extended to include the
neighbouring countries, namely, the front-line
States. Attacks have been frequent, especially
against the territory of Angola. In this respect,
my country declares its support and backing for
the struggle of the African citizens of Namibia
and South Africa and for the steadfastness of the
front-line States; we commend those States and
are proud of their steadfastness.
28. Colonialism and its surrogates, as well
as the exploitative companies, continue to pursue
their ambitions with tenacity and are prepared
to intervene in any country that is ruled by a
progressive and non-aligned regime desiring to
free itself politically and economically. This
was clear in the aggression against the
Jamahiriya and also in that against the Republic
of Seychelles, which was subjected to subversive
actions perpetrated by external elements that
wanted to create a state of anarchy and
instability in order to bring down its
progressive regime and replace it by one
subservient to colonialism and under its
political and economic influence. However, the
people of Seychelles were able to overcome and
thwart those acts of aggression. We in the
Jamahiriya, together with the forces of progress
and freedom^ support the people and the
Government of Seychelles against any foreign
maneuvers.
29. One of the regions that experience
tension as a result of intervention and the
installation of foreign bases is Central America,
where the people of Nicaragua are struggling
against the intervention of the United States of
America, which has been training hostile elements
and sending them to Nicaragua to carry out acts
of terrorism and subversion.
30. We are witnessing a liberation movement
sweeping through Central America. We see the
United States attempting to stifle that movement,
as is happening now in El Salvador and Guatemala,
in addition to its constant threats and
aggression against Cuba and the usurpation of the
Puerto Rican people's right to independence.
31. My country supports the struggle of the
peoples of Latin America against United States
imperialism and affirms its unlimited support for
Cuba and Nicaragua in their confrontation with
the American policy of aggression.
32. My country followed with increasing
concern the war which was forced on Argentina to
recover the Malvinas Islands from British
control. Anyone reflecting on that war and the
way it developed would be shocked by the
following facts. First, the United States claim
that it belongs to the group of American States
is only a covey for the protection of American
interests and the Fascist regimes which are
satellites of the United States Administration.
The United States has revealed its imperialist
nature and supported the British aggression
carried out against the Malvinas Islands.
Secondly, the British presence in the Malvinas
Islands is but a vestige of the old colonialism
which divided the world into spheres of influence
among the strong and used its control to implant
communities that did not belong originally to the
indigenous populations of the occupied
territories. Thirdly, the Malvinas war
emphasizes the inevitable confrontation between
the imperialist Powers and the third world
countries, which have to realize that all that
the super-Powers aim at is to have greater
domination and wider spheres of influence.
33. Therefore my country supports Argentina's
right to sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands
and calls upon the international community to use
all possible peaceful means to ensure finally the
ending of the British colonization of the
Malvinas Islands.
34. The United States exploitation of
internal strife in certain countries of Asia
aggravates tension in the region. The Afghan war
and the situation in Kampuchea represent areas
of tension in South-East Asia aggravated by
foreign interference in the affairs of those
countries. Therefore my country affirms the right
of those peoples to exercise their freedom of
choice. My country supports the principle that
Afghanistan should be an independent, non-aligned
country following the path of progressive Islamic
States.
35. The question of Western Sahara continues
to be one of the primary issues facing the
Organization and there is the threat of American
imperialist interference. We therefore emphasize
that the Organization should assume its
responsibility by affirming the right of the
Sahraoui people to free self-determination,
alongside the African peoples which have
exercised their right to freedom and sovereignty
over their territories.
36. The question of Cyprus is one that has
been before the United Nations for a long time
without any comprehensive solution being found.
My country supports direct negotiations between
the Turkish and Greek communities of Cyprus with
a view to finding a just solution to this problem
which would guarantee the independence and
neutrality of Cyprus.
37. The situation in the Mediterranean has
become dangerous as a result of the increasing
pressures of foreign war fleets and military
bases, especially American fleets and bases,
which have become a source of concern and a
subversive element, threatening the security of
Mediterranean countries. Everybody has heard
about the United States Sixth Fleet, which is
deployed constantly off the Libyan shore and
carries out provocative maneuvers, some of which
were in Libyan territorial waters.
38. It is our desire that that sea become a
lake of peace, free from foreign fleets and bases
and hotbeds of tension. Believing in the
necessity of realizing this objective, the
Jamahiriya has moved to settle the dispute
between itself and its neighbor, the sister State
of Tunisia, over the continental shelf. The
International Court of Justice delivered its
judgment in the case on 24 February 1982. The
dispute with Malta over the delimitation of the
continental shelf has likewise been referred to
the International Court of Justice.
39. The effects of the acts of confrontation
and war have sometimes extended to societies
which have not participated in such acts and are
not parties to them. This is evidenced by the
tragedies and consequences of the Second World
War which continue to surface in my country,
causing economic, social and environmental
problems. The minefields planted by the warring
forces over vast tracts of territory in my
country have delayed the carrying out of
development projects and raised the cost of such
projects, in particular that of prospecting for
minerals.
40. This problem has been discussed at
meetings of the non-aligned movement and here in
the Assembly, and several resolutions have been
adopted in this regard, affirming the
responsibility of the countries that planted
those mines to compensate the affected countries
for the material and moral losses caused by this
problem and calling for co-operation in the
provision of information about and maps of those
minefields.
41. The relevant decisions of international
and regional organizations, conventions and
international laws require the States which
participated in the Second World War and their
allies who planted mines in Libyan territory to
shoulder the responsibility, pay the required
compensation and co-operate in the final solution
of this problem. Accordingly, my country hopes
that such States and the United Nations will take
practical measures to place the responsibility
where it belongs and guarantee the right of the
affected States to compensation for the damage
sustained by them as a result of the effects and
vestiges of war.