STATEMENT
BY
H. E. Mr. SELIM TA DMOURY
AMBASSADOR PERMANENT REPRESENTA TI VE
OF LEBANON
TO THE UNITED NA TIONS
HEAD OF THE DELEGA TION
AT I HE
MILLENNIUM SUMMIT
OF THE
UNITED NATIONS
NE W YORK
FRIDAY, SEP T SEPTEMBER 8, 2000
Check against
delivery
Permanent Mission of Lebanon
to the United Nations
866 United Nations Plaza,
Suite 5 3 I, New York, New York 10017
Mr. President,
It is my pleasure to
congratulate you on your presidency over the Millennium Summit of the United
Nations. Thanks to your guidance and wisdom, I am confident that we will
witness together an unprecedented event. We want it to be a crossing to a new
era for humanity of today and tomorrow.
On this occasion, I commend
the Secretary-General's report to the Summit as it steers the United
Nations towards a phase of renewed promise and wisdom.
Mr. President,
Lebanon is particularly
proud to participate in this historically significant Summit, specially after
the recent liberation of its Southern part, thanks to the steadfastness and the
resistance of the Lebanese People and to the support of the International
Community. The Israeli occupation, which lasted for more than 22 years,
witnessed the loss of thousands of innocent civilian lives and inflicted
extensive damage on the country's most vital infrastructures. Insidiously, it
paralyzed its economy on the whole, impeded its socioeconomic development and
inhibited its historic contribution to human civilization, a contribution,
which Lebanon had been extending for five thousand years.
Lebanon considers the
liberation of its territory from the Israeli occupation an incomplete step, it
must be followed by a solution to the question of the Palestinian refugees,
particularly for those whom Lebanon has been hosting on its soil for more than
fifty years. Our ultimate objective is to reach a just comprehensive and
lasting peace based on the Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights up to the
line of June 4 , 1967, according to resolutions of international legitimacy and
to the term of reference of the 1991 Madrid Conference.
Lebanon also calls the
International Community to enable the Palestinian people to exercise their
inalienable rights and above all the right of self -determination and to
establish their independent State of Palestine with East Jerusalem as its
capital.
Mr. President,
While we gather today to
reaffirm our belief in the purposes and principles of the United Nations
Charter, Lebanon confirms the objective correlation between the establishment
of international Peace and Security and the development process and peace
building as well. It is so obvious that armed conflicts prevented and continue
to prevent countries and people from involving their human and economic
resources in the process of development and peace building.
Enhancing the United Nations
mechanisms of Peace making and promoting proper conditions for sustainable
development, require the reform of the most important bodies of our
Organization, namely the Security Council and the Economic and Social Council.
By doing so the United Nations system can contribute to the improvement of the
living conditions in developing countries. The reform of the Security Council,
extensively debated among member-States, should be based on transparency,
rationalization of working methods and equitable representation in light of
political, demographic and economic development occurred following the end of
the Second World War, though in order to achieve this goal the International
Community is invited to adopt a courageous action in this direction.
We equally view the
necessity to reform the Economic and Social Council by reevaluating and
revising its role and its mandate, in a manner that both the Security Council
and the Economic and Social Council could function in a harmonious system which
responds effectively to the needs of our century and no one today can separate
our right in enjoying peace and security from our right of achieving
development.
Mr. President,
The long march of the United
Nations has, particularly during the last two decades, witnessed valuable
achievements in the human rights arena. A significant number of international
treaties, mostly relating to the protection of women, children, refugees, codes
for peace and war have been adopted. Besides those treaties, a number of United
Nations bodies have been created to fulfill the treaties' objectives. Our
currently convening Millennium Summit should uphold these unprecedented
international and universal achievements which will be conducive to a new
global human order.
However, in spite of the
progress accomplished in the human rights domain, Arab territories remain under
Israeli occupation, their inhabitants suffering continuously under the
deliberate and violent infringements of the occupying forces. We remind the
International community of the long ordeal of Lebanese citizens, who had been
detained for years in Israeli manned jails, as hostages, denied due process of
law, in defiance of the principles of international laws and conventions
particularly of the Fourth Geneva convention of 1949, we call for their
immediate release.
Mr. President,
Lebanon strongly hopes that
the final declaration that will be issued pursuant to our summit would be a
renewed act of faith in the Charter of the United Nations, that its contents
would accurately reflect fair, peaceful and constructive solutions to the
uncertainties and predicaments of the people of all nations, and that its
headlines will bear witness to the Secretary-General's ceaseless endeavor
for peace and to his tireless efforts to redirect the United Nations to a
position of high compatibility with the aspirations of future generations.