Mideast situation – GA general debate – Verbatim record (excerpts)

Official Records

General Assembly

Fifty-fifth session

27th plenary meeting

Thursday, 21 September 2000, 3 p.m.

New York

President:   Mr. Holkeri…………………………(Finland)

The meeting was called to order at 3 p.m.

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The Acting President: I give the floor to Mr. Mohammed Said Al-Sahaf, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Iraq.

Mr. Al-Sahaf (Iraq) (spoke in Arabic): It is my pleasure to congratulate Mr. Harri Holkeri on his assumption of the presidency of the fifty-fifth session of the General Assembly, and I should like to convey to him our best wishes for a successful accomplishment of his tasks. I should also like to express our high esteem to his predecessor, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Namibia, who conducted the work of the previous session with notable skill.

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The Middle East region is suffering from a grave situation caused by the fact that the Zionist entity that occupies the Arab Palestinian territories possesses a huge arsenal of weapons of mass destruction of all kinds — nuclear, chemical and biological — and long-range ballistic missiles. The Zionist entity occupying Arab Palestine refuses to accede to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and refuses to place all its nuclear installations under the comprehensive safeguards regime of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Besides being a threat to peace and security in the Middle East region and the world, such a position exposes the double standard applied by the United States, which at once arms the Zionist entity and gives it unlimited support and deliberately ignores the provisions of paragraph 14 of Security Council resolution 687 (1991). This paragraph specifies that the measures imposed on Iraq should be applied to other countries in the region in order to make the Middle East a zone free of weapons of mass destruction and of all systems of delivery of such weapons, as well as to pursue the goal of imposing international prohibitions against chemical weapons. The Security Council has taken no action in this regard, despite the fact that Iraq has implemented all the required measures. Consequently, the way in which the Security Council has acted under American pressure in this context is a flagrant example of a double-standard policy.

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The Acting President: I now give the floor to His Excellency Mr. Hussain Shihab, Chairman of the delegation of Maldives.

Mr. Shihab (Maldives): Allow me at the outset to associate myself with previous speakers in congratulating Mr. Holkeri on his election to preside over the General Assembly at this historic session. It is a tribute to his distinguished political experience and to the invaluable contributions made by his country, Finland, to the work of our Organization.

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A comprehensive and permanent peace settlement in the Middle East continues to elude us. This is disappointing. We would like to reiterate our full support for the cause of the Palestinian people and to encourage the sponsors of the peace process in the Middle East to continue to pursue their efforts towards achieving a lasting peace in the region.

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The Acting President: I give the floor to the Chairman of the delegation of Niger, His Excellency Mr. Ousmane Moutari.

Mr. Moutari (Niger) (spoke in French): I wish at the very outset to convey to the countries and institutions represented here a message of sincere friendship from the people of Niger along with its fervent wish to maintain and continue to strengthen the links of peaceful coexistence and of fruitful and mutually beneficial cooperation with all the other peoples of the world.

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With regard to the Middle East, the recent failure of the Camp David process should further strengthen our determination in the tireless search for a just and lasting peace that can restore the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, including their right to an independent State, and ensure the return of the Golan Heights to Syria. In Western Sahara, it is time that the relevant United Nations resolutions were implemented for the self-determination of the Sahrawi people. In addition, the Iraqi people continue to be victims of an embargo that chiefly affects the most vulnerable sectors of society, including women and children. It is high time that the international community took the necessary measures to alleviate the pain of the Iraqi people.

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The Acting President: I now give the floor to the Chairman of the delegation of the Marshall Islands, His Excellency Mr. Jackeo Relang.

Mr. Relang (Marshall Islands): I would like first of all to congratulate the President, on his assumption of the office of President of the fifty-fifth session of the United Nations General Assembly. I wish him every success in this difficult and inspiring task. I would also like to express my sincere appreciation to his predecessor, Mr. Theo-Ben Gurirab, for his exceptional leadership during the fifty-fourth session.

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…I wish to state also that the Government of the Republic of the Marshall Islands encourages the leaders of Israel and Palestine to seize the historic opportunity that is within reach to peacefully conclude a framework agreement towards lasting peace in the Middle East. I wish to commend the efforts of the United States of America in this regard.

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The meeting rose at 7.30 p.m.