When the present
session of the General Assembly began on Tuesday, the
Secretary-General made important remarks about the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the
financial crisis. The world is witnessing extraordinary
financial turbulence, and all parties must shoulder their
responsibility.
At the same time, the current crisis should not
distract us from the need to achieve the MDGs. What
kind of world do we want to leave to our children and
grandchildren? Any parent who considers that question
for a moment will answer: a world in which my
children are safe and can build decent lives, free from
want; a world in which my children can reach their full
potential without fear of repression or terror; a world in
which my children are free and their rights are
protected.
Everything that we do as the United Nations is
about deep desires. There is a direct link between this
United Nations building and the homes of hundreds of
millions of families all over the world.
One man who forcefully reminded us that we are
responsible for the opportunities open to future
generations was Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In early
1941, in the darkest hour of the Second World War, he
gave us his vision of the future: the dawning of a world
in which people would enjoy freedom of expression
and belief and would be free from fear and want. After
the war, those freedoms became our moral compass.
They were set out in the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, proclaimed by this very Assembly
almost 60 years ago. Human rights remain the
cornerstone of Dutch policy.
If we look around us today, we can see that
reality falls far short of our ideal. We still live in a
world where, each year, more than 9 million children
die before they reach the age of five, and every day
millions of people live in fear of violence and the
abuse of power.
We cannot accept that. Together, the United
Nations comprises a working community and our work
is not done — not by a long way. Global challenges
require global solutions. Global solutions require
global action. Every one of us needs to ask ourselves:
What am I doing to make freedom a reality for people
at home and elsewhere?
What are we doing to bring about freedom from
want? In the past 10 years, millions of people have
managed to escape from poverty. In Asia and parts of
Africa, a great deal of progress has been made, thanks
to the efforts of many people. That progress should
inspire hope as we continue to work towards the
Millennium Development Goals. There is still so much
to do. In some countries, the situation is actually
getting worse, especially where health is concerned.
One child still dies every three seconds, one mother
every minute.
All Governments need to realize that good and
ethical governance is an essential foundation for
development, and realizing that, they must act
accordingly. That also applies to the current financial
crisis, where urgent action is needed. The financial
sector and regulators should quickly implement the
recommendations of the Financial Stability Forum:
stricter supervision, better risk management, greater
transparency and enhanced accountability. That is how
to restore confidence in the financial markets and
prevent future crises. The International Monetary Fund
should play a central role in that process by further
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stepping up its financial sector oversight. Together, we
should re-establish the stability and integrity of the
financial system.
Governments have a duty to provide food for
their people. The international community will support
all those who fight against hunger, want and disease,
but we must do so as efficiently as possible. We must
not waste resources; the need is too great. Above all,
we must work together. We must work together with
other Governments, certainly, but also with the
business community and civil society. Public-private
partnership works. I meet more and more entrepreneurs
who are committed to the Millennium Development
Goals and actively want to help. Let us grasp the hands
they extend.
The Netherlands welcomes the initiative of
Mr. d’Escoto Brockmann to place food security at the
centre of this session of the General Assembly. Rising
food prices hit the poor hardest. The position of small
farmers is particularly important. If they are able to
increase production, not only will their own families
benefit, but the local community will too. That is why
the Netherlands has earmarked extra funding for the
development of agriculture in developing countries.
However, there can be no food without water.
Water is the source of all life — 1.8 billion people
currently have no proper access to clean drinking
water, and their health, their very lives, are in the
balance. So the Netherlands has joined with countries
that believe that water is a human right, because access
to water is an essential part of freedom from want.
What are we doing to ensure that second essential
freedom — freedom from fear? Millions of people still
live in the middle of conflict and violence. We must
not accept that. Over the past 60 years, United Nations
peace operations have played an important role in
ending conflict. In many areas, the United Nations has
ensured that dormant conflicts do not flare up again. So
our efforts must continue, undiminished. Yet peace
operations alone are not enough. The root cause of a
conflict is often a political dispute, and it often requires
a political solution.
There is no place in a free society for torture.
There is no place for the death penalty. We all strive
for a life without fear, yet there are people who face
fear every day in order to defend human rights. To
recognize those brave people, the Netherlands has
introduced the Human Rights Defenders Tulip, a
special honour that will be awarded annually on
International Human Rights Day.
In our free world, no one is above the law and no
one is beneath it. The Netherlands is proud to host the
legal capital of the world in the city of The Hague. We
will continue to strive for an International Criminal
Court that is supported by all Member States. In a safe
world, right is stronger than might. Crimes that outrage
world opinion must always be punished. The
International Criminal Court is there to support us in
that task, and we must support the Court — all of us,
openly and unconditionally. A wider acceptance of the
jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice will
also strengthen the international legal order.
We also need to speak about freedom of
expression and belief. The debate on that issue often
leads to misunderstandings, incomprehension and fears
that national traditions may be swept aside. We can all
be proud of our cultures and traditions, of the things
that distinguish us from others. The challenge for every
Government is to affirm its people’s cultural and
religious values and customs, and at the same time to
build bridges with the rest of the world — bridges that
enable people, organizations and religions to meet and
draw closer. Finding the right balance is not easy, but it
is essential.
Governments are there for everyone — for men
and women; for people of all backgrounds and all
religious convictions; for monks, priests, rabbis and
imams; and equally for those who do not believe in a
supreme being. Religion offers people comfort and
inspiration in their personal lives. A religion is not a
system of dogmas that may be imposed on others by
force, and it is certainly not a justification for using
violence when one feels aggrieved.
Everyone is free to profess his or her faith, to
change religion or not to believe. We must all cherish
and defend the freedom of religion or belief. The same
goes for the freedom of people to express their views,
and those freedoms go hand in hand.
We all know that there are countries in the world
where those freedoms are violated, and to those
countries I say: Respect the right of every person to
freedom of religion and freedom of expression. They
are universal rights. They are universal freedoms. At
the same time, we must remind everyone who enjoys
those freedoms of their responsibility — the
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responsibility to show the same respect to others that
we claim for ourselves.
We need the United Nations to ensure those four
essential freedoms for which we stand, and the United
Nations needs us. A strong United Nations is one in
which universal values are central — a United Nations
with a fair and balanced Human Rights Council, a
United Nations that unites and delivers. When we
began building the United Nations together, the number
of countries worldwide in which people enjoyed a
reasonable level of freedom was around 15 per cent of
the total. Today, more than 60 per cent of countries can
be called free.
In the same period, the number of people
suffering from malnutrition has fallen by several
hundred million. The number of armed conflicts is also
declining, however serious the situation remains in
certain troubled regions. Progress is possible, but it
does not happen by itself. For the Netherlands, that is
an incentive to continue working, heart and soul, for “a
world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of
speech and belief and freedom from fear and want”.
In conclusion, let me echo President Roosevelt’s
words: “The world order which we seek is the
cooperation of free countries, working together in a
friendly, civilized society.”