Cape Verde
H.E. Mr. Pedro Verona Rodrigues Pires, President
24 September 2008
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Statement Summary
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PEDRO VERONA RODRIGUES PIRES, President of Cape Verde, said that the world today faced a multifaceted crisis in finance, food, energy and ecology, and general and collective security were at risk. At the same time, transnational organized crime and terrorism threatened international law and order, while global warming and climate change challenged authorities and institutions. Armed conflict was resurgent or lying in wait with new factors sparking tensions in various spots around the world.
Without security, social stability, political and institutional cohesion, and especially mutual trust among international political actors, it would be difficult to find solutions to global challenges such as extreme poverty, pandemics and economic inequality, he said. While the Millennium Development Goals aimed to address such issues, the current financial crisis, with its unstable markets and volatility in the movement of capital, put global economic stability at risk. To that end, new forms of financial regulation, fair and acceptable to all, were needed.
He further said that the food crisis had put hundreds of millions of people in a precarious situation. Urgent action was required to guarantee increased agricultural production able to meet current and future needs. That called for partnership with the rich, more technically advanced States, along with aid from international mechanisms and institutions. It also required sustained support for modernization and increased agricultural production in the affected regions, particularly in Africa.
Escalating oil prices also posed grave problems for less developed and non-oil-producing economies, he said, and called for continued work to find alternative energy sources to promote a reduction in dependency on fossil fuels. Global measures were urgently needed to overcome the environmental crisis, which affected us all, for the good of all.
Recent experience had shown that no State could find solutions to such complex challenges alone. The United Nations was the institution which provided the essential conditions to assume collective responsibility. To do so, the Organization must adapt to the challenges of the twenty-first century. To that end, United Nations reform was indispensable, especially enlargement of the Security Council, which would strengthen its legitimacy.
[Source: GA/10751]
