Botswana

I wish to extend to the President the sincere congratulations of my delegation on his election to the presidency of this historic session of the General Assembly. Botswana and Portugal have enjoyed the best of relations over the years. It is therefore with great pleasure that I assure him of Botswana’s support and cooperation as he conducts the deliberations of this body. Let me also take this opportunity to pay a special tribute to his predecessor, my dear brother and colleague the Foreign Minister of Côte d’Ivoire, His Excellency Mr. Amara Essy, for the skilful manner in which he guided the work of the forty-ninth session. His was a most successful presidency, of which, as Africans, we feel proud. We salute our indefatigable Secretary-General, His Excellency Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, and his team of dedicated staff for their selfless service to the international community at the most difficult and trying period in the history of our Organization. The Secretary- General’s tenacity of purpose and his untiring efforts in the search for peace are crystallized in his comprehensive and thought-provoking report on the work of the Organization. Five decades ago no one could have predicted with any degree of certainty the future course of events in the aftermath of the most devastating war on the face of the Earth. It was therefore a feat of wisdom and vision that the founding fathers of our Organization accomplished when they conceived and established, from the ravages of that tragic war, a global Organization that has had such a profound impact on the conduct of international relations and diplomacy. That the Charter of the United Nations has been amended only thrice in its 50 years of existence bears testimony to their foresight and diplomatic skill. The formation of the United Nations captured the imagination of peoples across continents, not only because its Charter promised to protect succeeding generations from the scourge of war, but also because it championed the right of the colonial countries and peoples to self- determination and independence, at a time when that was considered antagonistic to the national interests of the 21 colonial Powers. In addition, the Organization made a commitment “to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom”. This historic session of the General Assembly offers us a unique opportunity to evaluate the achievements and progress made in the fulfilment of the ideals so brilliantly and boldly expressed by the founding fathers in the Charter. It is time for introspection and reflection on the work of the Organization and a time to institute reforms, as necessary, to attune the Organization to a changed world and the challenges ahead. It is regrettable that the military and ideological rivalry between East and West should have hamstrung the role of the United Nations in the maintenance of international peace and security during the first four and half decades of its existence. Although the world was spared the possible destruction that could have been visited upon it by a third world war, the cold war led to the loss of many lives in regional conflicts across continents — on the Korean Peninsula and in Cambodia, Angola, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Vietnam and the Middle East, to mention only a few. In colonial countries, and in Africa in particular, the struggle for self-determination and national independence was perceived through the prism of super-Power rivalry, which perception resulted in bitter liberation wars. The past five years have, however, seen the birth of a new era, an era of hope for the United Nations, characterized by general goodwill and cooperation in international relations. In other words, we are celebrating 50 years of the existence of the United Nations in a new- found atmosphere of relative peace and stability in the world. We should therefore commit and rededicate ourselves to the purposes and principles of the Charter as we draw the road map for the Organization in the next 50 years. The unity and resolve of the United Nations, particularly as reflected in the facility with which, in the post-cold-war era, the Security Council takes decisions pertaining to the maintenance of international peace and security, has dramatically enhanced the efficacy of the United Nations, a United Nations which has been freed from the shackles of ideological confrontation. The Security Council has indeed scored remarkable successes in the maintenance of international peace and security over the past few years. We have witnessed successes in Cambodia, Namibia, Mozambique, El Salvador and, more recently, Haiti. And this very day an agreement of great import has been signed in Washington, D.C., between Israel and the Palestinians. This new atmosphere of international cooperation has, however, not been without problems and setbacks. The tragedies of Somalia, Sierra Leone and Liberia remain a thorn in the flesh and conscience of the international community. The internecine tribal wars in the former Yugoslavia and in the Abkhaz region of Georgia have remained intractable, and the traumatic civil wars in Afghanistan and Tajikistan continue with total abandon. These problems attest to the fact that all is not well in international affairs. The United Nations must intensify current initiatives aimed at addressing these conflicts. The international community can never be at peace when part of its body politic is being ravaged by conflict and war. As we approach the next millennium, the responsibility falls on the generations that have benefited from 50 years of relative peace, 50 years of the United Nations, to prepare the ground for an even better Organization to serve future generations in the next 50 years and beyond. We should establish a new system of collective security in which unilateralism and the pursuance of narrow national interests for undue advantage should give way to multilateralism and collective responsibility in addressing international problems. Complex peace-keeping operations can succeed only where there is multilateral cooperation and the pursuit of policies which can yield long-term results. Concerted efforts must be made to adopt consistent criteria for the resolution of global problems. The question of equitable representation on and increase in the membership of the Security Council has gained currency in recent years, and for good reason. The United Nations of 50 years ago was definitely different from the United Nations of today. The number of Member States has swelled over the years, bringing in countries of divergent national character and historical backgrounds; and membership in the Security Council must reflect this reality. In other words, the Security Council should be a concentrated reflection of the cultural and philosophical diversity represented in the General Assembly. After all, democracy is about numbers, and the United Nations, including the Security Council, ought to be the best school for the teaching and practice of democratic principles. 22 We should exercise great care, however, in addressing the question of the expansion and restructuring of the Security Council, lest we create new problems in our zeal to solve old ones. We should guard against the Security Council’s remaining or becoming an exclusive club for the pursuance of the policies and strategic national interests of the rich and powerful nations. At the same time, we should avoid making the Security Council a big and unwieldy enterprise which would crumble under its own weight. We should strike the right balance between equitable representation and efficiency and effectiveness. The report of the Secretary-General clearly shows that peace-keeping operations are very expensive. Over the past five years the budget of United Nations peace-keeping operations has grown from an annual figure of approximately $600 million to a staggering projection of $3.6 billion by the end of this year. The United Nations cannot hope to sustain this kind of budgetary escalation. Greater attention must be given to preventive action. Here we agree entirely with the Secretary-General when he states in the “Supplement to An Agenda for Peace” that “It is evidently better to prevent conflicts through early warning, quiet diplomacy and ... preventive deployment”. (A/50/60/para. 26) A multifaceted approach is required to develop a capability, including substantial human and material resources, that would enable regional organizations to detect potential conflict situations and prevent them from breaking out. In this context, the Organization of African Unity (OAU) Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution was established in response to the many challenges facing the African continent in the field of peace-keeping. It is an expression of Africa’s readiness to take effective measures aimed at solving conflicts within the continent. We welcome the support of the Member States, international organizations and individuals that have generously made resources available to the OAU Mechanism, and we urge the international community to make similar contributions. We also welcome the conclusions of a series of conferences on conflict prevention and peace-keeping in Africa sponsored by the British Government, the latest of which was held in Gaborone, the capital of my country, on 7 and 8 August 1995. Botswana is convinced that training, planning and preparation, an effective early-warning system and logistic support are fundamental to the OAU’s capacity to predict and defuse conflicts and, once they have erupted, to undertake peace-keeping operations. The financial support of the international community is crucial if the peace-keeping capability of the African countries is to be realized. The United Nations, in general, should be placed on a firm financial foundation if it is effectively to tackle the mammoth tasks facing the world today, including assistance to regional arrangements in conflict prevention and peace-keeping. The question of the financial emergency in which the United Nations so often finds itself, because of failure by Member States to honour their financial obligations to the Organization, should not be allowed to fester into the next century. It seems logical, at least to Botswana, that the decisions and resolutions which we adopt as Member States, and which have financial implications, should be accompanied by a commitment to make prompt and regular contributions to the various budgets, programmes and funds of the Organization. Otherwise there is no sense in adopting such decisions and resolutions. As stated earlier, the resources needed for peace-keeping operations alone are such that every Member State must make its contribution if we seriously expect results from the Organization. We cannot talk about the maintenance of international peace and security without reference to nuclear proliferation, because of all weapons of mass destruction, nuclear weapons pose the greatest threat to international peace and security. In this regard, Botswana is satisfied with the outcome of the Review and Extension Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non- Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). The States Parties not only agreed to extend the Treaty indefinitely, but also adopted the principles and objectives for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament and committed themselves to strengthening the review process for the Treaty. We were disappointed that some nuclear Powers resumed testing immediately after the conclusion of the Conference. The States Parties further committed themselves to complete negotiations, no later than 1996, on a universal, legally binding and internationally and effectively verifiable comprehensive nuclear test-ban treaty. The onus now rests on nuclear-weapon States to honour their end of the deal. My delegation firmly believes that the only way to protect the world from the scourge of nuclear weapons is through their complete elimination. 23 The contribution made by the United Nations and its specialized agencies in the field of health, especially in the developing countries, has been most impressive. Life- threatening diseases such as polio, tuberculosis, smallpox, malaria and river blindness, to name but a few, have largely been eradicated in most parts of the world. The other visible benefit of the work of the United Nations in development has been the transfer of technology, especially to the developing countries, resulting in improved sanitation, education, human resource development and food production and storage. Currently, the United Nations is spending millions of dollars on research and related expenditure on the AIDS pandemic, which is threatening the very existence of humankind and is posing a serious threat to the economic development of many nations. It is our sincere hope that the world will quickly find a cure to save humankind from the scourge of this pandemic. We are concerned that in recent years the resources available to some specialized agencies of the United Nations have been declining. This has negatively affected their contribution to economic development in the developing countries. It is clear from the report of the Secretary-General that the core resources of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) have been decreasing since 1992, and this has resulted in national indicative planning figures in developing countries being reduced by 30 per cent from their original levels. This is an unfortunate trend indeed for developing countries, considering that the UNDP is the agency of the United Nations charged with responsibility for the financing and coordination of technical and development assistance. And the negative impact this trend has had in the execution of development projects and programmes in the developing countries cannot be overemphasized. It is imperative that the ongoing dialogue on the reform of the United Nations give due consideration to the important role that these agencies and programmes play in the improvement in the living standards of peoples in the developing countries. The reduction of the administrative costs and the rationalization of the operations of these organizations should be carried out at the expense neither of their capacity to deliver the goods and services nor of the quality of their product. In this regard, I wish to reaffirm the decision the African Ministers of Industry took in Gaborone, Botswana, on 8 June 1995, in which they appealed to the international community, particularly the developed countries, to support the maintenance and strengthening of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) to enable it to continue participating actively in the industrialization of Africa. The past five years have witnessed major developments in the social and economic fields. The international community has made great efforts in addressing issues of international concern in these areas. In this regard, the successful holding of the World Summit for Children, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the World Conference on Human Rights, the World Summit for Social Development and, most recently, the Fourth World Conference on Women are illustrative. While the holding of these conferences in itself deserves commendation, the international community should not be satisfied merely with summitry. It should strive to adopt declarations and plans of action which are realistic and implementable. Above all, there should be a genuine commitment to providing the necessary resources for the implementation of these declarations and plans of action. It is now four years since the General Assembly, in recognition of the difficult social and economic situation prevailing in Africa, adopted the United Nations New Agenda for the Development of Africa. At its high-level- segment meeting held in Geneva from 3 to 6 July this year, the Economic and Social Council concluded that progress in the implementation of the New Agenda had been slow and insufficient, and reaffirmed that success depended on the full support of the international community. It is clear that while the primary responsibility for economic development in Africa rests with the African Governments and peoples themselves, there is still an absolute need for the support of the international community. One of the priority areas of the United Nations New Agenda for the Development of Africa is regional cooperation and integration. In this connection, we in southern Africa are engaged in efforts to ensure development through regional cooperation. The Southern African Development Community (SADC), after 10 years of rehabilitating and developing infrastructure, has embarked on closer cooperation and integration aimed at, inter alia, free movement of goods, capital, services and people. One of the recent major developments in the building of the community was the accession of the Republic of Mauritius to SADC at the organization’s summit in August 1995 in Johannesburg, South Africa, thereby bringing the membership of SADC to 12. We are 24 aware that we have set ourselves a difficult task as a region, but there is no alternative to this path of collective self-reliance if our region is to survive in the current competitive international economic environment. We therefore call upon the international community to continue its support for SADC and its programme of action. To conclude, I wish to reiterate that this historic session of the General Assembly offers us an opportunity to evaluate the achievements, review the lessons of the past and chart a course for the future of our Organization. An important component of this introspection and reflection on the work of the United Nations should be the improvement of public awareness of the United Nations, building a wider constituency and demonstrating that the Organization will continue to be relevant in the years to come.