Mali

A year ago, during the thirty-sixth session, President Moussa Traore, head of State of Mali, affirmed from this rostrum that "The aspiration of our peoples to live in dignity and in spiritual, moral and material tranquility is thus being increasingly jeopardized". Alas, the past year confirms that statement which should be a source of fruitful meditation and deep reflection for us. In fact, 1982 will above all confirm the prevalence of relationships of force in international relations. The international community has been shaken by political, economic and military crises which treaten the very foundations of human civilization. The past year, more than any other, seems to have been a year of disillusion. Solutions to fundamental questions basic to the balance of the world which were at one time within our reach crumbled because of the resurgence of warlike activism and last- minute intransigence. That is why the eyes of the world, a world which legitimately expects from us just and lasting solutions for its stability, its security, its economic, social and cultural progress, are fixed particularly upon the thirty-seventh session of the General Assembly. Because we know that Mr. Hollai is an experienced diplomat with a long and full career; because he has dedicated part of that career to defending, in this very Organization, the fundamental objectives of the Charter, the Republic of Mali, a friend of his country, the People's Republic of Hungary, places great hopes in his well-deserved election which will, we are convinced, contribute to enriching our common action in maintaining peace, respect for the sovereign equality of States and the peaceful coexistence of all nations. Of course, I cannot conceal the legitimate pride that my delegation takes in the wide-ranging and positive action accomplished so skilfully by Mr. Hollai's outstanding predecessor, Mr. Kittani, that worthy son of the third world, of Iraq, a country which is a friend of my own, who acquitted himself so ably in they should like also to reiterate to the new Secretary-General, Mr. Perez de Cuellar, the best wishes of the Government of the Republic of Mali, which reaffirms its full readiness to co-operate most sincerely with him. One of the long line of individuals who devote their talents and their political courage to the cause of peace, he bears with him the faith and hopes of the third-world countries which are resolutely committed to preventing the bipolarization of the world. He has already reflected in stirring terms in his report on the work of the Organization and in his speeches the meaning of his fight for justice and equity and also for the strengthening of the system of collective security of the United Nations, an irreplaceable instrument for world peace. The United Nations is neither called upon nor able to provide magical solutions to international problems. But we had become accustomed year after year, in spite of certain negative factors, to winning victories over ourselves which reflected our deep dedication to the ideals, goals and principles of the Charter and to have our awareness of our international responsibilities heightened day by day. In the course of the past decades, the United Nations has given particular meaning to its ascent towards universality. New forces have strengthened its action and given new dynamism to its structures. The virtues of wisdom and realism have often dispersed the clouds which, streaked with lighting heralding lethal thunderbolts, darkened the international horizon. Where agreement was sometimes lacking, hope at least was allowed. That is why the United Nations can quite rightly be pleased at having made its appreciable contribution to the national liberation struggles. It can take pride in having prepared international development strategy decades tor low-income countries. It can also be proud at having created hopes for the establishment of a new international economic order. Well may it be proud also at having contributed to a sharper perception of the danger represented by the arms race, especially the danger of atomic weapons, and at having placed the individual at the center of its concerns by stressing the magnificence and protection of his basic rights. Thus, in spite of pitfalls, in spite of certain sharp setbacks, in spite of uncertainties that have often characterized the international situation, at each of the previous sessions the Assembly has attempted to pay its share for the safeguard and maintenance of peace. The feeling has prevailed that where we lacked immediate solutions to international problems, dialogue did enable us to discharge our international responsibilities with respect for our fundamental interests. But this is where our hopes stop short. Indeed, as the Secretary-General himself recalls in his brilliant report "The past year has seen an alarming succession of international crises as well as stalemates on a number of... international issues". Hence the thirty-seventh session of the General Assembly has opened in the atmosphere of a terrible, distressing vacuum. It is therefore easy to understand why the recent twelfth special session of the General Assembly, devoted to disarmament, in which many distinguished personalities participated, concluded without even reflecting the hopes that had been placed in it. And, worse still, while it was meeting Beirut was crumbling under Israeli bombs and new so-called conventional weapons were appearing on the battlefield, which thus served as a testing ground. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea has been adopted, but with its chances of implementation blocked. The North-South dialogue on the coming into being of the new international economic order has foundered on national egoism. The racist, illegal Pretoria regime has strengthened its alliances, heightened its repression against South African patriots and violated, with increasing brutality and even more bloodshed, the sovereignty and integrity of neighboring States. Some Member States persist, in their delirium of power, in their attempts to break the will of peoples for independence. The United Nations will not at this session be enriched by the admission of one of the nations still under domination-although we had every reason to hope that that would be so. Thus the challenges that we have committed ourselves to meeting are in fact taking on frightful dimensions. The thirty-seventh session of the Assembly is being held at a time when Palestinian people is experiencing the most tragic situation in its existence. The Zionist war machine has been unleashed against the Lebanese and Palestinian peoples with unequalled furor. The siege of Beirut, the invasion of that city, the systematic destruction of Palestinian refugee camps, hospitals and schools and, lastly and above all, the Sabra and Shatila massacres lend the war in Lebanon the character of genocide, a crime against mankind. That outright aggression against Lebanon is a premeditated act of war against the sovereignty and integrity of a State Member of the Organization. The horrors that have been perpetrated bring back terrible memories. But the peoples that do not have short memories have spoken up everywhere in the world, including in Israel itself, against this repetition of the massacre of an entire people. What took place in Lebanon disturbs and frightens us, because there is no greater incitement to crime than the apathy of those who, under the dangerous illusion that only the neighbor's house is burning, accept the inadmissible role of hearing and seeing no evil. In international relations, indifference is the most serious complicity, because it makes it possible for evil to progress and worsen. The Zionist aggression in Lebanon is the consequence of the unpunished acts of Israel which therefore continues to defy the international community every day-as though the odious aggression of June 1981 against the Iraqi people were not enough and as though the arrogant annexation of the Syrian Golan Heights were a minor event. Today it is the Lebanese and Palestinian civilians who are the innocent victims of the blind violence characteristic of the policy of the Zionist State. The Security Council should have, for the cause of peace, drawn from Chapter VII of the Charter its inspiration and justification for action to induce the Government of Israel to respect the elementary rules of international law. It is high time to come to our senses, because Zionism just like apartheid and both are by their very essence generators of tension-will expose mankind to a new conflagration. Let us therefore act together to guarantee the collective security of all the nations of the world. There is no other solution for the Middle East crisis, and especially the Palestinian question, than that set forth at this very rostrum a year ago, at the 23rd meeting of the thirty-sixth session, by the head of State of Mali, who, even at that time, welcomed what was still called the Fahd plan and advocated, first, withdrawal from all the occupied Arab territories and, secondly, recognition and guarantee of the exercise of the national rights of the Palestinian people under the leadership of the PLO, its sole authentic representative. Those proposals were reaffirmed once again by the non-aligned movement during its recent Extraordinary Ministerial Meetings. They are being increasingly accepted, even by Israel's friends, including the most fervent ones. They are the backbone of the recent plan, of the Twelfth Arab Summit Conference, at Fez, which the Government of Mali supports. Israel's brutal rejection of those proposals is not at all surprising. This systematically rigid attitude is part of the Zionist logic based on defiance and arrogance. The leaders of the PLO, with their usual grandeur, have solemnly declared that they adhere to those realistic proposals. Israel, on the other hand, rejects any solution which might stop the massacre in the Middle East and enable all the peoples of that region to live in peace, honor and dignity. However, we must remember this: the Palestinian fighters have left Beirut but their destiny is not buried there. They left Beirut with the strong determination to impose their national identity. The repercussions of the situation in Palestine have on four occasions almost led mankind to perdition. In the face of the persistence of that danger and the imminent outbreak of even more serious conflicts, the relevant General Assembly resolutions on the convening in 1983 of an international conference on Palestine demand attention as very valuable proposals in the accomplishment of our compelling duty to restore peace to the Middle East and finally enable the Palestinian people to enjoy its inalienable right to freedom. That right to freedom is part of the whole series of rights that the Charter acknowledges for all peoples and that have been codified, particularly in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But, like Israel, South Africa does not understand these principles, which have international scope, for the system which it has made into a system of administration, denies man his very existence. This unacceptable system is disturbing the harmony of international relations. In its resolution 36/172 B the General Assembly proclaimed the year 1982 the International Year of Mobilization for Sanctions against South Africa. Since then, the recommendations made to that end by many political, economic and social governmental and nongovernmental organizations have taken on new meaning, on this twentieth anniversary of the arbitrary imprisonment of Nelson Mandela, whose vision of freedom is the same as that of those great men who by their courage and actions gave meaning to life. The banning of the apartheid regime from United Nations activities is only poor consolation for those who are truly committed to defending the basic rights of man and peace. Chapter VII of the Charter has a wealth of resources for isolating and destroying that hateful system of It is that system which is preventing a just and peaceful solution to the problem of Namibia. The United Nations by legitimately assuming trusteeship over that Territory committed itself to helping the Namibian people to complete the re- conquest of its homeland. The steps taken in accordance with that commitment have been essentially of two types: the first was the recognition of SWAPO as the sole authentic representative of the Namibian people, because it is the only organization which has palm in blood the price of the dignity of its homeland; the second led to the adoption by the United Nations of recommendations and decisions pertaining to the Namibian issue, including Security Council resolutions 385 and 435, adopted unanimously, which contain a plan to settle the crisis. The methods for implementing that plan were the subject of long and patient negotiations between Pretoria and, respectively, the United Nations and five Western Powers. An exceptional opportunity was thus presented to us to abide by our commitments in regard to the maintenance of international peace and security. But Pretoria remained frozen in its total lack of understanding for the requirements of peace. Each time that a glimmer of hope appeared on the horizon for Namibia's accession to independence, the racist regime of South Africa snuffed it out through successive recantations-some involving fantastic allegations in regard to the partiality of the Organization, others putting the emphasis on the presence of Cuban troops in Angola. The duty incumbent upon us is to commit ourselves resolutely to correct implementation of the relevant resolutions on Namibia. The implementation of those resolutions which pertain solely to the independence of that Territory cannot have any impact on or link with commitments entered into by States bordering on South Africa, in the exercise of their sovereignty, to ensure the security of their peoples in the face of precisely the warlike incursions of South Africa. Mali's people and leaders vigorously oppose that grotesque machination, which is only a fallacious amalgam aimed at delaying the process of independence for Namibia. For Mali, the presence of Cuban forces comes within the exclusive sovereignty of Angola and cannot be an element for negotiation between South Africa and those who are fighting-that is, the heroic SWAPO combatants. The position adopted by the United Nations, to lead Namibia to independence, is based on the purposes and principles of the Charter. If it has provoked the wrath of South Africa, as was to be expected, it is even more valid. It is up to the Namibian people and to them alone to seek and apply the appropriate political formulas to guide them in carrying out their national duty. Any attempt to subject its independence to other purposes will only lead to the preservation of foreign interests. The Government of the Republic of Mali hopes that between now and the end of the current session of the General Assembly, an independent Namibia, with its territorial integrity intact, will take its rightful place in the United Nations. That independence will only be deserved, in view of the great sacrifices made by the courageous Namibian people in the defense of the ideals of the United Nations. It is on behalf of those ideals of justice, equity and peace that the Government of the Republic of Mali has committed itself to the quest for a peaceful solution to the problem of the future of the Sahraoui people. We have on several occasions set forth and analyzed here the various steps taken by Africa and the many initiatives taken by the head of State of Mali to bring about a satisfactory solution to this painful-because it is fratricidal-conflict. The question of Western Sahara, which bears the imprint of incomplete decolonization, cannot be solved without free expression by the Sahraoui people-that is to say, the exercise of true and inevitable self-determination. Africa, in its traditional wisdom, had already at the fifteenth session of the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the OAU, at Khartoum, recognized that to be the only solution. But it was only at the eighteenth session, at Nairobi, that unanimous agreement was reached by the parties to the conflict to the organization of a general and free referendum on self-determination. One could have thought, therefore, that the real dangers inherent in that conflict had been eliminated because the path of wisdom and realism had finally been taken by the protagonists, thanks to the vigilance and firmness of Africa. But to think that was not to understand sufficiently the demons of history. If the latest African meeting, the nineteenth session of the OAU Assembly, held at Tripoli, bore the stamp of the Sahraoui equation, it is comforting to note that once again Africa showed proof there of its traditional wisdom. My country, Mali, which is honored to have constantly benefited from the confidence of Africa in all its attempts patiently to search for a solution to that delicate problem, will continue its efforts to ensure that our continent, as in the heroic epochs of resistance and struggles for independence, will in unity complete the elimination of the after-effects and last vestiges of the colonial system. That noble mission must be the concern of all African States, forced us not to forget that the OAU remains above all the symbol of anti-colonial resistance. The current crisis in our continental organization will be mastered. Eternal Africa will be able to draw from its age-old values the resources necessary to allow our unified organization to pursue its constant march towards happiness, progress and solidarity among African peoples. To live in peace means to establish and strengthen links of co-operation and tolerance of political and economic choices. That means non-interference in the internal affairs of other States and the strengthening of relations of good-neighborliness. The policy of good-neighborliness recognized by the United Nations is indubitably one of the most dynamic factors for the exploitation of the enormous potential which continued progress in science and technology makes available to nations. The crossroad for several civilizations which enriched each other, the cradle of a people which linked its destiny to that of others, Mali has made good-neighborliness one of the pillars of its foreign policy, The language that it desires to speak to its neighbors is that of sincerity, tolerance and respect for the basic principles which govern the existence of States. Mali is always open to dialogue, to constructive discussions which unite people around common basic interests. That policy of positive good-neighborliness also implies active solidarity among fraternal peoples faced with temporary difficulties. That is why our country constantly pursues its efforts within the African family to safeguard the national unity and territorial integrity of Chad. Those objectives can only be achieved without any outside interference in the internal affairs of an independent and sovereign State, whose current crisis is no reason for placing it under any trusteeship. It is also on the strength of the principles I have just mentioned that we appeal to our brothers on the Horn of Africa and in Kampuchea, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and Cyprus honorably to end conflicts which can only expose them further to the appetites of the forces of domination and make the fruits of the struggle for emancipation increasingly bitter as well as dangerously weaken the front that the third world has decided to form for the restoration of its human and natural resources. From Korea there does not come any glimmer of hope that would permit us to believe in the just redress of one of the errors of the last world war, which established arbitrary borders-an artificial line within a single country, all of whose people aspires profoundly to the unification of their common homeland. We hope that fraternal dialogue and fruitful co-operation will triumph so that the great Korean family will come together on the basis of the 10-point reunification plan, which is an infinite source of inspiration. As can be seen, an analysis of the international situation reminds one of the situation during the great fear of the year 1000. Today conflicts born of liberation struggles are taking on formidable dimensions. Brothers are tearing each other apart. The policy of diktat is resurfacing. The desire to impose solutions to international disputes through threats and the use of force is again common currency. Conceived and drawn up on the ruins of a monstrous war, the Charter of the United Nations was designed to open the world onto an era of reconciliation of hearts and minds. But, unfortunately, the spirit of competition continues. Nuclear experiments continue although, according to all estimates, the existing stockpile of nuclear weapons is more than capable of destroying our planet several times over. There is no agreement on the spiraling arms race, because the arguments advanced in the negotiations to restrain it are attached to concepts which tend to transform effect into cause. The initial concept can be reduced to the old adage, "If you want peace, prepare for war". However, people have never stopped preparing for war and have never stopped being in a state of war. Armament is seen to be a stabilizing element in international relations, whereas, on the contrary, the maintenance of such stability is conceivable only without the threat of the use of armed force. The second concept is that no disarmament is possible without the prior establishment of a climate of international confidence. Here again, the terms of the discussions on disarmament are inverted. Confidence is dissipated; it emerges through a prism whose pieces must be put together on the basis of a common agreement. Here the stumbling-block which has impeded negotiations on disarmament is again the balance of forces. Once again rhetoric has prevailed over the real will to negotiate. In an atmosphere of negotiation in which confidence does not reign or in which the stockpiling and improvement of weapons appear to be the only guarantees against widespread conflict, the basis on which the balance of strength rests is only a figment of the imagination. The arms race leads inevitably to war. Only the kind of political will that has made possible the adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and the International Development Strategy for the First and the Second United Nations Development Decade can lead to results in the negotiations on disarmament. The manifestation of this political will was, unfortunately, lacking during the launching of the global negotiations at the thirty-sixth session. Nevertheless, here again, the goal pursued was very close. The need for the establishment of a new international economic order was seen by all to be a demand of our times. A number of obstacles along the way were eliminated after long and patient negotiations. The consensus which enabled progress to be achieved was not maintained into the final phase of the negotiations, although these pertained only to questions of procedure. Here again, in the final phase of the negotiations, the North-South dialogue lost its raison d'etre. A group of States, thinking only of the status of their national economies, blocked the dialogue that had been begun with a view to finding concerted solutions to common problems. These problems may be rerouted, they may be subordinated to temporary concerns, but their scope and their universality can only become more compelling. They are common problems because they pertain to the interdependence of States, and they require common solutions, without which the world economic situation will only deteriorate further. An analysis of the world economic situation shows on the one hand a more marked deterioration of trade relations and on the other hand a trend towards absorbing the crisis through selfish and isolated national policies. That is the way in which I have summarized the bitter observations in the World Economic Survey, 1981-1982: "Economic expansion decelerated markedly throughout the world... The deceleration was particularly intense in the developing countries, most of which experienced a significant fall in per capita incomes". The growth rates of the developing countries have been falling dangerously since 1978. The terms of trade have deteriorated further; export earnings have not been sufficient to ensure debt servicing, while at the same time official development assistance has become more scarce and been tied to more and more conditions. For the first time since the welcome establishment of UNDP-and we wish to praise its efforts and its merits-UNDP has had its resources reduced. The Ottawa, Cancun and Versailles economic summit meetings, as well as the United Nations Conference on the Least Developed Countries, gave rise to many hopes, which were very quickly dashed. Global negotiations, the immediate launching of which is seen every day to be an undeniable necessity, although promised, do not seem to be on the horizon. However, the industrialized countries are beginning in their turn to be affected to their very foundations by something from which they thought they were shielded, that is, an upheaval in the anachronistic world economic system. In fact we are on the eve of an implosion of the international monetary system. An increasingly large number of developing countries can no longer pay the North the interest on their numerous debts, which have reached the outrageous sum of $500 billion. Even though they transfer every year to the North the tidy sum of $50 billion to service the debts and even though the South receives annually from the North only $25 billion in the form of official development assistance, the banks of the North are still threatened with collapse. This is in no way surprising. This disturbing observation only underscores once again the degree to which the world economy is interdependent. We must above all be convinced that it is upon an improvement of the living conditions of the three quarters of the population of our world which continues to live in extreme distress that the world balance and the maintenance of international security depend. For millions of people whose average income is less than $1 a day, it takes little thought to comprehend and realize the fact that every day about 4 million times that income goes into the production of devices that could deprive them of the meagre benefits they hope to derive for their subsistence. How can we explain to them, when every day they wonder what their chances are of obtaining a small crust of bread, that the cost of a jet fighter is equivalent to that of 15,000 tons of wheat and that the cost of a bomber is equivalent to that of 30 schools or 15 hospitals? How is it possible for them to understand-and here we are referring to the statistics of the World Bank-that 800 million of them are condemned to illiteracy while sums that defy the imagination are swallowed up in the unbridled arms race? For us, the peoples of the Sahelian region, where a relentless drought prevails, where millions of people see their very survival endangered, this dangerous evolution of the world's civilization is stupefying. The international community has, of course, decided to mobilize to restore life to the Sahel. We are therefore pleased once again to thank the many States and groups of States and governmental and non-governmental international organizations that have helped us to carry out some of our projects. However, it remains true that the desert continues to advance. The drought that prevails in the Sahelian regions can no longer be attributed to temporary meteorological phenomena. It prevails as a profound and more and more widespread evil, for the combating of which, however, technical and human resources exist. A careful look at the phenomenon of drought, because of its persistence and its magnitude, shows a disturbing evolution in the ecology of our world. Yet the time is past when lightning caused man to dash for cover. The struggle to keep our environment healthy and sound so that man can flourish by applying all his creative skills, has never been closer to being won. Unfortunately, thousands of experts, and even the most competent among them, devote their intelligence to improving the war machine that is destined to destroy mankind. The rehabilitation of the world economy so as to give it new life and vigor is thus among the primary challenges we shall have to meet in the course of this decade if we are to preserve peace. The Republic of Mali, because it is determined to participate actively in the collective effort to rehabilitate the world economy, has chosen a course of development that is in keeping with the ethic of its people and with the demands of the modem international community. The building of an independent and planned national economy, in our view, is the appropriate response to the concerns of our people. Having made this choice, we are endeavoring to adapt our economic policies to meet the deepest aspirations of our population. Like our neighbors, we believe that the patient construction of regional groups and subgroups such as the Organization for the Development of the Senegal River, the West African Economic Community, the Conference of Saharan States and the Economic Community of the States of Western Africa is the only way significantly and decisively to contribute to the realization of the Lagos Plan which resulted from the important second special session of the OAU Assembly in April 19S0 devoted to a thorough consideration of economic questions of concern to the African continent. The guidelines contained in that plan, which is now an historic one, arc for Africans the only way to survive in the face of the serious economic crisis. At the thirty-sixth session, in this very Hall, President Moussa Traore spoke these words: "Together with you, we wish to restore the confidence of our people in their creative abilities. Together with you, we wish to preserve international peace and security." We have come here once again to reaffirm our readiness to build, together with all the States of the international community, another world, a new world commensurate with our creative genius so that universal civilization can flourish. This readiness on the part of the Republic of Mali to work for peace, justice and equity is constant. That is so because our aspirations and hopes are shared by the rest of the international community. Those hopes will exist as long as peoples are compelled to resort to weapons to defend their raison d'etre and their dignity. They will exist as long as racism and its most odious manifestation, apartheid, continue as a system of government. A world that trembles in fear of nuclear peril is not a free world, and it is even less a world of peace. People who are ill for lack of care, who are sick of being hungry will, without warning, upset the present precarious order, precarious because it is obsolete. The past year has been fraught with threats. That is why we are here in this Hall with the other members of the Assembly to clear the ground for the establishment of a more stable system of collective security. We should not be shouldering our responsibilities and we should betray the confidence of our peoples if in our actions we failed to provide concrete, pragmatic, realistic and lasting solutions for the sole raison d'etre of man: that of living in peace with himself and with his fellow man, free of fear of future misery and conflicts, in ever larger freedom.