At
the outset, Sir, I should like to warmly congratulate
you on your election to the presidency of the General
Assembly at its sixty-third session, which undeniably
reflects the high esteem that the international
community has for your country of Nicaragua, which is
a friend of Niger. Your election is also the well-
deserved culmination of an exemplary diplomatic and
political career. The length and breadth of your
experience makes you the right person to carry out the
demanding and noble task entrusted to you. Allow me
to assure you of my delegation’s commitment to
extending to you our constant support during your time
in office. Niger is particularly honoured to be working
side by side with you as a Vice-President of the
Assembly for the sixty-third session.
May I also pay tribute to your predecessor,
Mr. Srgjan Kerim, for the exemplary manner in which
he led the sixty-second session and, in particular, for
having grappled with the burning issues of the day,
including the food and energy crises and climate
change. With regard to His Excellency Secretary-
General Ban Ki-moon, I should like to express our full
appreciation for the significant progress on
fundamental issues made by the Organization under his
guidance.
The subject you have chosen, Mr. President, as
the central theme of the general debate during this
session is highly relevant. For several months and to
varying degrees, all members of the international
community have been affected by the overall rise in
food prices. That crisis has gripped the attention of
every international body. Mr. Olivier de Schutter,
Special Rapporteur on the right to food, was far-
sighted in sounding an alarm during a press conference
held here at the United Nations in which he identified
the initial structural causes and called for international
action. Aware of the urgency of the situation, the
Secretary-General set up the High-Level Task Force on
the Global Food Security Crisis in order to provide a
comprehensive and unified respond, support
Governments and peoples affected and adopt a
Comprehensive Framework for Action to meet the
challenges.
The Government of Niger would like to
congratulate the Secretary-General on his initiatives.
We would also like to warmly congratulate his Task
Force for their work and for taking into consideration
the numerous efforts and views on this issue. The
challenge now is to implement the recommendations in
order to save entire groups of people in the world’s
most vulnerable countries from the tragedy of hunger.
For its part, Niger has taken major specific
measures to address the sharp rise in the cost of basic
foodstuffs in order to mitigate the effects on the living
conditions of the most vulnerable people.
However, in a country facing the recurrent
problem of drought and its consequences for
agricultural production, the truth is that only lasting
solutions will help us to counter the effects of the
phenomenon and to progressively eliminate the
uncertainty that characterizes Niger’s production
system.
The Government of Niger has therefore decided
to give priority to the three programmes introduced at
the Doha Conference on Consolidating Food Self-
sufficiency in Niger, which was held in June 2007.
Those programmes are all the more promising given
the potential boon to agriculture as a result of the
upcoming construction of the Khandaji dam on the
Niger River. The Government will develop its
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approach on the basis of that project and those
programmes so as to provide credible response to meet
the food needs of the people of Niger.
The international financial crisis, which is
affecting many countries and is today being
exacerbated by the globalization of the world in which
we live, requires that we harness our efforts and
initiatives to find solutions requiring commitment on
the part of us all. While rich countries fear the risk of
widespread economic recession, the poorest countries
fear food insecurity caused by prices they can no
longer afford. Paradoxically, when it comes to the
financial crisis and the consequences of climate
change, it is the poorest countries that always pay most
dearly for the turbulence affecting the globalized
world. My delegation therefore supports the proposals
made by President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, which
were previously espoused by President Lula da Silva of
Brazil, calling on the international community to deal
urgently with the issue.
We also hold out hope that the upcoming Doha
Follow-up International Conference on Financing for
Development will produce results that include safety
net measures to protect the poorest countries from
external shocks that could compound their
vulnerabilities.
Although the food, energy and financial crises are
front and centre on the international stage, there are
also other challenges facing the international
community in the areas of peace, security, development
and human rights, among others. We must
acknowledge the fact that international peace and
security has been as sorely tested by conflicts as by
other scourges that are equally devastating to the
harmonious development of peoples and countries
throughout the world. Those scourges include
international terrorism, drug trafficking and the illegal
trade in small arms.
Niger is especially concerned about the impact of
trafficking in drugs and weapons; and especially mines,
throughout the Sahelo-Saharan strip. The actions of
certain armed groups are the true cause of the unrest
prevailing in the northern part of our territory. Their
activities are increasingly being brought under control
thanks to steps taken by the relevant institutions of our
country. We therefore believe that there is a need for
increased willingness and cooperation in this area,
similar to that demonstrated in connection with the
Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy that we adopted in
2006. While we acknowledge that some progress has
been made, we must also say that further efforts and
commitments are needed from the international
community in supporting countries in conflict or
emerging from it.
It is important that we support the progress made
in countries where, happily, peace is becoming more
entrenched, including Liberia, Sierra Leone, Burundi,
Guinea-Bissau and the Central African Republic, which
was recently inscribed on the agenda of the
Peacebuilding Commission. We welcome in particular
the resumption of the national peace and reconciliation
process in Côte d’Ivoire following the invaluable
impetus provided by the Ouagadougou Agreement in
2007. In that regard, my country congratulates and
encourages all Ivorian politicians on their commitment
to peace. We hope that, with the support of their
partners, whose invaluable contributions my delegation
also commends, the national peace and reconciliation
process will culminate in the holding of the upcoming
presidential elections.
We also welcome the resumption of the
Manhasset cycle of negotiations as a useful and
necessary step in the search for a mutually acceptable
and lasting solution to the issue of Western Sahara.
With regard to the Great Lakes region, my
delegation welcomes the entry into force, on 21 June
2008, on the Pact on Security, Stability and
Development in the Great Lakes Region. We believe
that this instrument will enable States parties to address
the underlying causes of conflict and to address the
challenges they face in the areas of security,
governance and development. We also believe that the
Pact is part and parcel of the new vision for the
settlement of conflicts in Africa, perfect examples of
which have just been provided by Nigeria and
Cameroon with the resolution of the issue of the
Bakassi peninsula, and by Gabon and Equatorial
Guinea with the agreement on a mediation process in
connection with their territorial dispute.
Nevertheless, conflicts persist in Africa and the
Middle East that require appropriate involvement by
the international community. With regard to the
situation in the Sudan, my delegation welcomes the
appointment Mr. Djibril Yipènè Bassolé, former
Minister for Foreign Affairs of Burkina Faso, as the
Joint African Union-United Nations Chief Mediator for
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Darfur. We are certain that Mr. Bassolé will provide
new momentum and help to improve the situation in
that brotherly country by, among other things,
facilitating the implementation of the Comprehensive
Peace Agreement, signed in January 2006 between the
Government of the Sudan and the Sudan People’s
Liberation Movement/Army with regard to the
Southern Sudan, and by helping to find an acceptable
solution for Darfur.
With regard to Somalia, we welcome the
agreement signed on 9 June in Djibouti between the
Transitional Federal Government and the Alliance for
the Re-Liberation of Somalia. We urge the United
Nations to do everything possible to support those
countries, both by more effectively backing the African
Union Mission in Somalia and by deploying an
international peacebuilding or peacekeeping force.
The bilateral negotiations between Israelis and
Palestinians that have begun in the context of the
commitments undertaken at the Annapolis Conference
are a genuine source of satisfaction for my delegation.
We believe that the parties should take advantage of
those negotiations. We therefore encourage them to
maintain the momentum of Annapolis, which reflected
the willingness of the parties concerned to make
progress towards peace. We should also like to
welcome the recent initiative of President Nicolas
Sarkozy of France in the context of the Euro-
Mediterranean Conference. We fervently hope that all
those measures will make it possible to reach a speedy
agreement that enshrines the vision of the two-State
solution of Palestine and Israel living side by side in
peace and security within internationally recognized
borders and on the basis of the relevant resolutions of
the Security Council, the Arab peace initiative and the
Quartet’s road map.
We welcome the Doha agreement on Lebanon,
which confirmed the virtue of dialogue and cleared the
path for speedy presidential elections and the
establishment of a Government. The international
community should support the Lebanese people who,
through that agreement, have demonstrated their
political maturity and ongoing desire for national unity.
The various peace processes now underway will
not be successful unless confidence-building measures
are first put in place. In that regard, there is a crucial
need to find solutions to the issues of disarmament,
non-proliferation and the eradication of the trade in
small arms. That is especially true for the poorest
countries, who pay a heavy price in conflicts sustained
by the trade in small arms and light weapons. My
delegation therefore deplores the failure at the past
session of the Disarmament Commission, another in a
series due to the lack of consensus on the agenda.
As we have seen, the challenges in the area of
international peace and security are numerous and
complex. Unfortunately, for some of us they are
accentuated by other serious, recurring and even
chronic threats. As the 2005 World Summit
acknowledged in its Outcome Document, those threats,
which also have an effect on development, are closely
linked to other areas in which the United Nations is
active, namely, peace, security and human rights.
We therefore believe that the year 2008 is critical,
given that it is replete with major events that could
contribute to development. I am referring to the Doha
Round of trade negotiations, which are at a standstill
today; the high-level event on the implementation of
the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) midpoint
to the target date for their implementation, the Accra
High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness; and the
Review Conference of the Monterrey Consensus on
financing for development.
In the quest for global well-being, Africa and
countries in special circumstances — especially least
developed countries, landlocked developing countries
and small island States — deserve focused attention
commensurate with their situation. My delegation
would like to pay homage to Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon for his personal commitment and unwavering
support for initiatives in that regard intended to benefit
Africa. Following the G8 Summit at Heiligendamm,
the Secretary-General established the Africa Steering
Group to monitor the achievement of the MDGs in
Africa. With the support of a working group, the
Steering Group is responsible for finding ways to
coordinate and rationalize efforts associated with
technical and financial assistance in order to speed up
Africa’s progress. That initiative is very timely for a
country like Niger, whose strategy to reduce poverty
and speed up development for the period 2009-2012
focuses precisely on the achievement of the MDGs.
Moreover, the various efforts of the Government in
recent years in the areas of health, education and
access to water have already led to a significant
improvement in the relevant indicators.
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The recommendations of the Steering Group and
the conclusions of the recent high-level meeting on the
MDGs, jointly organized by the President of the
General Assembly and the Secretary-General, provide a
very clear course of action for making progress.
Sustainable development is the main theme of the
Economic and Social Council’s 2008 substantive
session. The current debate has clearly shown that such
development cannot be achieved without appropriate
funding, aid effectiveness and good governance.
In conclusion, the delegation of Niger believes
that the United Nations is the world’s premier forum. It
must serve as a beacon in those times of both hope and
uncertainty, and ensure collective security in the world
by means of economic, social and cultural cooperation.
That is why we need genuine reform of the United
Nations system. My delegation believes that the reform
effort will remain incomplete unless there is a
significant change in the Security Council, including as
regards both equitable representation and its working
methods.
In numerous other areas currently under
consideration — such as, among others, evaluating the
experiences of countries involved in pilot programmes
on system-wide coherence and revitalizing the General
Assembly, which we must ensure — my country will
contribute as much as it can to adapting our common
Organization to the challenges we all face in building a
world of peace, prosperity and development.