BY
HIS
EXCELLENCY
AL-HAJ
ABDUS SAMAD AZAD, M.P.
MINISTER
FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS
IN
THE GENERAL DEBATE
AT
Mr. President,
Distinguished
Delegates,
The historic Millennium Summit and
the forward-looking Declaration it adopted have set a very positive tone for
the Millennium Assembly which is now continuing with this general debate.
We extend our heartiest
felicitations on your well-deserved election as the President of the 55th
session. Your deep commitment to the
values and principles of the United Nations gives us the confidence that the
affairs of this Assembly are in very good hands.
I also congratulate Foreign Minister
Theo-Ben Gurirab, my dear colleague, for his superb leadership of the 54th
General Assembly. We are grateful to
him for his invaluable guidance in the preparations for the Millennium Summit
and its outcome.
May I also express Bangladesh's
sincere thanks and gratitude to Secretary-General Kofi Annan for his vision in
convening the Millennium Summit and for his untiring efforts in its success.
His Millennium Report contains a number of good proposals and ideas, which we
wholeheartedly support. I reiterate Bangladesh's full support and cooperation
to the Secretary-General in his determination to enhance the efficiency and
effectiveness of the United Nations.
Twenty-six years ago, this month,
when Bangladesh had just acquired her membership of this great institution, the
Father of the Nation, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman addressed this august
body. He underscored our commitment to the Charter of the United Nations. For
our people, it was a great moment. We have traveled long since that time and
our commitment to the UN has only grown in strength.
As Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina
mentioned in her speech at the Millennium Summit, "In this organization,
the powerful and the weak, the large and the small, the wealthy and the
struggling, come together as equals to address their problems, to forge cooperation
and to further understanding. It certainly is in our interest to strive for a
United Nations which can fulfill our common goal - a better world for every
human being".
To the people of Bangladesh, human
rights is .a sacred trust because we were victims of its abuse. And yet the
person who had championed the cause of fundamental rights was denied the very
basic of all human rights, the right to life. I speak Mr. President, of the
ghastly murder of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman along with almost his
entire family and close relations by a group of assassins on 15 August 1975.
The murderers had committed a crime and a human rights abuse of the worst form.
And, what could best be described as an arrogant affront to human rights and democratic
principles, the killers were granted immunity from law by the so called
Indemnity Ordinance issued by the undemocratic regime of that time. The present
democratic Government in Bangladesh has repealed the Indemnity Ordinance since
the assumption of office. The accused have been tried and found guilty of
murder and the verdict of the Court of law has been announced. Some of them
however have managed to escape justice by finding asylum in foreign lands. If
human rights is to dominate the agenda of the new century, we would urge the
international community for its cooperation in bringing these self-confessed
killers to Bangladesh to face justice. Here I would like to express my
appreciation and gratitude for those countries which have been cooperating with
us in the matter.
To Bangladesh, a very important
manifestation of human rights is the right to development, which needs further
assertion by the international community. In ensuring it, it is essential that
our collective efforts are focused on addressing poverty. Unless we take
positive actions in this regard, globalization will be more of a challenge and
less an opportunity - freedom from want would remain elusive. The challenges
are particularly daunting for the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and merit
priority attention. Just as globalization touches us all, marginalisation of
these vulnerable countries would affect us all in the global family. We would
urge the international community to make every effort for the success of the
Third UN Conference of the LDCs in 2001 in Brussels.
In the past decade, the
international community has made tremendous progress in recognizing the
challenges and adopting elaborate programmes of actions in the areas of social
development, human rights, environment, population, human settlement and food security
as well as. on women and children. Now the challenge before us is to fulfill
the commitments we have made together. Let us resolve that the next decade will
be the decade of implementation.
At home, in facing the challenges of
the coming decades, poverty eradication has been set as the overarching goal of
the present Government of Bangladesh under the leadership of Prime Minister
Sheikh Hasina. We are making increasingly higher investments in our people, in
our social and human development.
In ensuring effectiveness of this
involvement, Bangladesh has focused on the rights of women and children.
Bangladesh has become parties to most of the international instruments relating
to their rights. During the Millennium Summit, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina
ratified the Optional Protocol to the women's convention and the two Optional
Protocols relating to sale of children, child prostitution and child
pornography and on children in conflict situation. Adoption of the "Woman
and Child Repression Prevention Act, 2000" by our national parliament is
also a major step forward in eliminating violence against women and children.
Mr. President,
Unfortunately, our efforts towards
sustainable human development are set back through calamities beyond our
control. Sometimes it is natural disasters like floods, cyclones, tidal bores.
Sometimes it is silent killers like dengue fever, arsenic contamination of
ground water. Today two-third of Bangladesh population is at risk due to
arsenic contamination of drinking water. The Government has responded to this
crisis with urgency and determination, in collaboration with international
agencies like World Bank, UNICEF, WHO as well as NGOs. Adequate emphasis has
also been given to ensure alternative sources of safe drinking water for the
community.
Mr. President,
In her statement at the Security
Council Summit two weeks ago, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina emphasized that
international peace and security must also be understood in terms of human
security. She also emphasized that we should prevent war crimes, crimes against
humanity and genocide on the civilian population. We believe that the
establishment of International Criminal Court can effectively deal with these
crimes. We signed the Rome Statute last year and have already initiated the
process for its early ratification.
As an elected member of the UN
Security Council, Bangladesh remains committed to our obligations to the
maintenance and preservation of international peace and security.
Bangladesh strongly supports
enhanced effectiveness of the UN Peacekeeping Operations as well as its peace
building measures. Bangladesh is proud to be one of the largest troop
contributors to UN Peacekeeping Operations in fulfillment of our commitment to
global peace and security. In this context, we welcome the recommendations of
the Brahimi panel and look forward to their consideration by relevant
intergovernmental bodies and the Secretariat. Here we would emphasize that the
resources needed for their implementation should not undermine in any way 'the
other existing programmes.
An area of our common concern has
been the UN sanctions, their effectiveness and their impact. It is a matter of
satisfaction that the Security Council; after years of debate, has set up a
Working Group under Bangladesh chairmanship to study different general issues
related to sanctions. We are confident that the work of the Group will help the
Council to agree on measures to streamline the sanctions regimes.
Mr. President,
To ensure peace and development, we
must move ahead with an agenda for real disarmament. The nuclearisation of our
own region in South Asia has caused us concern. As one of the least developed
regions in the world, South Asia cannot afford to get into a race for nuclear
weapons. Reflective of her Constitutional commitment to total and general
disarmament, Bangladesh took the lead in South Asia to sign the CTBT in 1996
and ratifying it earlier this year. We also were among the first in South Asia
to sign the Ottawa treaty on the ban of, anti personnel mines, which was also
ratified by us during the Millennium Summit along with the Convention on
Certain Conventional Weapons (CCWC) and all its Protocols.
Mr. President,
Bangladesh considers peace and
development to be fundamental rights. One cannot endure without the other. The
UN and its member-states must continue to espouse and promote a culture of
peace. Bangladesh took the initiatives for the international observance of this
millennium year and the first decade of the 21st century respectively as the
Year for the Culture of Peace and Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-violence
for the Children of the World.
Mr. President,
As we have said on earlier
occasions, Bangladesh believes that the UN should be prepared to respond
effectively to the challenges of the new century. Since UN reforms were
initiated by Secretary-General Kofi Annan, a lot has been done; but much more
could be added on. We aspire for greater democratization and transparency in
the organizations of the UN. We also believe that involvement of NGOs and other
actors of civil society can enhance UN's effectiveness in a big way.
Mr. President,
A changed world needs a changed
United Nations - an organization for today's world. We need to demonstrate
courage and determination to preserve the United Nations as the world's most
universal forum. ; Its founding fathers spoke about the scourge of war. Today's
UN would only live up to the global reality if it can not only free world's
people from the scourge of war, but also save
the succeeding generations from the scourge of poverty.
I thank
you, Mr. President.
Joi Bangla, Joi Bangobandhu
May Bangladesh live for ever
May the United Nations live for
ever.