Allow me at the outset to congratulate Mr. Miguel
d’Escoto Brockmann on his election to the presidency
of the General Assembly at its sixty-third session and
wish him every success in his work.
In the context of the agenda of the current session
of the General Assembly, I would like to address the
following issues, which we consider to be of the
utmost importance and are directly relevant to the
security and sustainable development of the Central
Asian region.
First are the issues related to the continuing
intensification and escalation of confrontation in
Afghanistan, the increasing radicalization of the
situation and the provocative terrorist statements by the
fighters. Despite the enormous efforts and measures by
the international community and coalition forces to
support peace in Afghanistan, the situation,
unfortunately, is deteriorating. The civilians are
perishing.
What further exacerbates the situation in
Afghanistan is the growing volume of drug trafficking.
Today the production of opium in Afghanistan accounts
for more than 8,000 tons, or over 90 percent of global
production. It must be taken into consideration that
drug trafficking is becoming one of the important
sources of financing for fighters, destabilizing the
situation in Afghanistan itself and in neighbouring
States.
From this high rostrum, I would like to state
again that we are deeply convinced that recent
developments in the situation in Afghanistan show ever
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more clearly that the Afghan problem cannot be
resolved by the use of armed force, military means and
increasing militarization alone. The war, which has
been ongoing for close to 30 years, has destroyed both
the economic and social infrastructure, led to the
impoverishment of the population and, we must admit,
has deprived people of any belief in a future and has
provided fertile ground for recruiting more and more
fighters.
The developing situation dictates the need to
radically reconsider the approaches to resolving the
Afghan problem. It is our firm belief that our main
priorities must be providing targeted economic aid to
Afghanistan, building and moulding economic and
social infrastructure, ensuring employment
opportunities and resolving the acute problem of
combating poverty.
It is necessary to do everything we can to ensure
respectful attitudes to national and religious values and
the centuries-old traditions and customs of the
multinational and multi-faith people of Afghanistan,
and on that basis to bring together the conflicting
forces. An important instrument for achieving such
goals could be a return to the successful Six plus Two
group on Afghanistan that successfully functioned in
the middle of the 1990s under the auspices of the
United Nations and transforming it into a Six plus
Three group by taking into consideration contemporary
realities and including in its make-up neighbouring
States, Russia and the United States, and NATO.
As the President of Uzbekistan, Mr. Islam
Karimov, has repeatedly underscored, the realization of
such an initiative — which has already been called for
from a number of international rostrums — could be a
worthy alternative in achieving peace, stability and the
revival of Afghanistan.
The outcomes of the high-level event on the
Millennium Development Goals that took place on
25 September 2008 demonstrated that the international
community needs to resolutely seek concrete results in
achieving the goals in the sphere of development as
formulated in the Millennium Declaration.
In that context, all of us share responsibility for
the reasonable use of natural resources, including the
transboundary rivers in Central Asia. Experience itself
has shown that disregarding well-known United
Nations declarations and international standards on the
joint use of water resources of transboundary rivers can
lead to very serious and at times tragic ecological
disasters, as borne out by the ongoing catastrophe of
the drying up of the Aral Sea, with all of its unforeseen
consequences for the tens of millions of people in the
region.
According to the fundamental provisions of
United Nations conventions, all decisions on the use of
the water of transboundary rivers in Central Asia,
including the construction of hydropower facilities,
must in no way inflict damage on the ecology of the
region or infringe on the interests of the populations of
neighbouring countries, nor should they upset the
established balanced use of the water of transboundary
rivers by all States in those rivers basins. In the case of
damage, all measures must be taken to remove or
mitigate such damage, and, if necessary, the issue of
compensation must be raised.
We are convinced that compliance with those
requirements must be mandatory in the implementation
of various projects such as building hydropower
facilities in Central Asia, including compliance by
international financial institutions that wish to
participate in such projects.
We are also convinced of the importance of
expanding cooperation and strengthening interaction
between the United Nations and the International Fund
to Save the Aral Sea. In this respect, we consider it
timely and necessary to grant the Fund observer status
in the General Assembly, and we call upon Member
States to support the draft resolution on this matter
during the Assembly’s sixty-third session.
This year in Uzbekistan we will widely observe
the sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, and a programme of action dedicated to
that most significant event has been approved. As of
1 January 2008, Uzbekistan fully abolished the death
penalty and introduced habeas corpus, a democratic
principle of justice. The adoption of the law on
guaranteeing the rights of the child and the ratification
of the International Labour Organization Minimum
Age Convention and Convention on the Worst Forms
of Child Labour have become important steps in
ensuring human rights in Uzbekistan. We have adopted
a national plan for implementing the commitments
undertaken in those Conventions. Aware of the urgency
of the problem of human trafficking at both domestic
and international levels, in April 2008 Uzbekistan
adopted its law against human trafficking.
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Committed to the ideals and principles of human
rights, Uzbekistan advocates gradual reforms and
changes with the main purpose of ensuring peace in
society and greater well-being of the people.
In conclusion, I want to underscore once again
that Uzbekistan stands ready to engage in further
constructive multilateral interaction within the United
Nations framework to address the urgent issues on the
agenda of the international community.