The future of the United Nations is
being decided in the denouement of
the Iraqi crisis
SPEECH BY FELIPE PEREZ ROQUE, MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE REPUBLIC OF CUBA, TO THE 58TH SESSION OF THE UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY, SEPTEMBER 26, 2003, NEW YORK

Your Excellencies:

In the last century we had two terrible world wars, in which more than 80 million human beings died.

The lesson having been learnt, it seemed that the United Nations Organization came into existence to ensure that war would never happen again. Its charter, approved in San Francisco nearly 60 years ago, proclaimed the purpose "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war." However, since that time we have endured wars of aggression and conquest, colonial wars, border wars and ethnic wars. Many peoples have been left with no other alternative than war to defend their rights. Moreover, in the last 13 years the scourge of war has cost a further six million lives.

Six decades ago, the world order proclaimed in the UN Charter was sustained on the military balance of two superpowers. A bipolar world came into existence that generated confrontation, divisions, the Cold War and almost a devastating nuclear war.

It was not an ideal world, far from it. But with the disappearance of one of those superpowers, the present world is worse and more dangerous.

Now the world order cannot be cemented on the "spheres of influence" of two similar superpowers, or on "reciprocal dissuasion."

So on what should it be based? On the honest and generous recognition of the only superpower that, far from disrupting the peace, should be contributing to the construction of a peaceful world with the right to justice and development for all.

Does the war in Iraq contribute to that objective? No. Its result is totally contrary to the ideal of preserving peace, strengthening the role of the United Nations and consolidating multilateralism and international cooperation. Unfortunately, it is a fact that those who have the greatest capacity for preventing and eliminating threats to peace are precisely those currently provoking war.

Should the U.S. government acknowledge that truth which almost all of us in this hall share? Yes.

In doing so, what could be humiliating or injurious to that great nation’s prestige? Nothing. The world would recognize that it would be a beneficial rectification for everybody, after unleashing a war that only a few nations supported – through shortsightedness or paltry self-interest – after having confirmed that the pretexts wielded for it were not certain, and having observed the reaction of a people that, as any invaded and occupied people will do, are beginning to fight and will continue fighting for respect for their right to free determination.

And so, should the occupation of Iraq end? Yes, and as soon as possible. It is the source of new and even graver problems, not their solution.

Should the Iraqis be left to freely establish their own government and institutions and to make decisions over their natural resources? Yes, it is their right, and they will not cease from fighting for it.

Should the UN Security Council be pressured to adopt decisions that would weaken it even further, ethically and morally? No, that would eliminate the last opportunity of profoundly reforming it, expanding it and democratizing it.

The future of the United Nations is now being decided in the denouement of the international crisis created by the war in Iraq.

The gravest of the dangers currently lying ahead of us is the persistence of a world ruled by the law of the jungle, the might of the strongest, privileges and waste for a few countries, and the dangers of aggression, underdevelopment and despair for the great majority. Will a world dictatorship be imposed on our nations or will the United Nations and multilateralism be preserved? That is the question.

I believe that we would all agree that the role of the United Nations is irrelevant today or at least, is going in that direction. But some of us are saying that out of concern and a wish to strengthen the organization. Others are saying it with a secret satisfaction and encouraging the hope of imposing their designs on the world.

We should say it in all frankness. What role is the General Assembly playing today? Virtually none, that is the truth. It is more or less a forum for debate without any real influence or any practical role at all.

Are international relations being ruled by the purposes and principles made sacrosanct in the UN Charter? No. Why is it that now, when philosophy, the arts and science are reaching unprecedented levels, that the superiority of some nations over others is once again being proclaimed, and other nations that should be treated as sister countries are being called "dark corners of the planet," or the Euro-Atlantic periphery of NATO?

Why is it that some of us feel that they have the right to unilaterally launch a war when we proclaim in the UN Charter that armed force should not be used "save in the common interest," and that "collective measures" should be taken to preserve the peace? Why is there no more talk of employing peaceful means to solve controversies?

Can we believe that everyone is fomenting friendship among our nations based "on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples?" And if so, why then have my people had to suffer and are still suffering from more than 40 years of aggression and economic blockade?

By approving the Charter the principle of the sovereign equality of states was established. So perchance are we equal and do all the member states enjoy similar rights? According to the Charter, yes; but according to raw reality, no.

Respect for the principle of the sovereign equality of states, which should be the cornerstone of contemporary international relations, can only be established if the most powerful countries practically accept to respect the rights of others, even when we do not possess the military might or economic power to defend ourselves. Are the most powerful and developed countries prepared to accept the rights of the rest, when that does not even minimally prejudice their privileges? I am afraid that they are not.

Are the principles of the non-use or threat of the use of force, non-interference in the internal affairs of states, the peaceful arrangement of controversies, respect for territorial integrity and the independence of states still applicable? According to the spirit and the letter of the Charter. But are they perchance so in reality?

In the last few decades, a small group of developed countries has benefited from this situation and that is fact. But those times are coming to an end. They are also beginning to fall victim to the imperial policies of one superpower. Should they not consider, with modesty and commonsense, the need to work with the 130-plus countries of the Third World that have had to suffer this unjust order and are prepared to try to persuade the most powerful to leave its arrogance on one side and fulfill its obligations as a founder member of the United Nations?

Mr. President, Cuba believes that we should not and cannot renounce multilateralism; that we should not and cannot renounce the United Nations; that we cannot and should not renounce the struggle for a world of peace, justice, equity and development for all.

For that, in Cuba’s view, we have to achieve three immediate objectives.

In first place, an end to the occupation of Iraq, the immediate transfer of real control to the United Nations and the beginning of the process of recovery of Iraq’s sovereignty and the establishment of a legitimate government, fruit of the decision of the Iraqi people. The scandalous redistribution of Iraq’s wealth must end immediately.

This would be beneficial to the United States, whose youth are dying there waging a unjust and inglorious war; it would be beneficial to Iraq, whose people could begin a new stage of their history; it would be beneficial to the United Nations, which has likewise been a victim of this war; and it would be beneficial to all our countries, which have had to suffer international economic recession and a growing insecurity that threatens us all.

In second place, without further dilation, we have to confront a real reform of the United Nations and, above all, a profound process of democratizing it.

The situation has become unsustainable. Proof of that is the shameful incapacity of the Security Council to prevent the war on Iraq in the first place, and then not even to order the Israeli government not to expel or assassinate the leader of the Palestinian people who, as the same Council decided more than 50 years ago, should have had an independent state for a long time now.

That fact that the U.S. government has employed its right to veto on 26 occasions in order to protect Israel’s crimes is evidence of the need to abolish that unjust privilege.

A reform that would return to the roots of the founding of the United Nations, that would guarantee effective respect for the Charter and reestablish collective security mechanisms and the rule of international law.

A reform that would guarantee the capacity of the United Nations to preserve the peace, and lead the struggle for generalized and total disarmament, including nuclear disarmament, to which many generations have aspired.

A reform that would restore to the United Nations its prerogatives to fight for economic and social development and elemental rights – such as the right to life and food – for all the planet’s inhabitants. That is even more necessary now when neoliberalism has resoundingly failed and an opportunity to found a new system of economic and international relations is opening.

We need to restore the role of the United Nations, and for all states, large and small, to respect its Charter; but we do not need those reforms to founder unnoticed in a bureaucratic process of adapting what remains of the United Nations to the interests and caprices of a handful of rich and powerful countries.

Lastly, we need to return to the debate of the grave economic and social problems currently affecting the world, and to make a priority of the battle for the right to development of nearly five billion people.

The Millennium Summit committed us to work toward extremely modest and insufficient goals. But now everything has been forgotten and we don’t even discuss it. This year 17 million children under five will die, not victims of terrorism, but of malnutrition and preventable diseases.

Your Excellencies, at some point will there be a discussion in this hall, with realism and a spirit of solidarity, of how to reduce by half the number of persons suffering from extreme poverty – more than 1.2 billion – and those suffering from hunger – more than 800 million – in line with the Millennium Declaration?

Will there be a discussion on the almost 900 million illiterate adults?

Or will the Millennium Declaration prove to be a dead letter, like the fate of the Kyoto Protocol and the decisions of a dozen summits of heads of state?

In Official Aid to Development, the developed countries will this year offer Third World countries some $53 billion. In exchange, they will charge them more than $350 billion in interest on their external debt. And, by the end of the year, our foreign debt will have grown.

Do the creditors maybe think that this unjust situation could last for a lifetime?

Do we, the indebted, have to resign ourselves to lifelong poverty?

Is this tableau of injustices and dangers for the majority of countries perchance the one dreamed of by the founders of the United Nations? No. Like us, they also dreamed that a better world is possible.

These are the questions that, with all respect, we would like certain persons in this hall to answer.

I am not talking of Cuba, a country which, having been sentenced to death for wanting to be free, has had to fight on its own, not only thinking of itself but of all the peoples of the world.