“I wish for a life without war and shelling. I wish I could be successful at school.” Ten-year-old Amina said that to an Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs team a few days ago. She is one of more than 500,000 children in Idlib who are displaced, many of them for the second or third …
Three months ago, I visited Hiroshima. I stood in the vast empty space that was created by the explosion 75 years ago. I saw the ruined buildings and talked to survivors. One of them said to me, “We have the means to destroy our own civilization” and “what happened once can happen again”.
The truth…
Here in New York over the past few days, we have all heard a great many speeches — at the Climate Action Summit, the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development, the countless side events, and of course here at the speech-making marathon known as the general debate.
If we were to analyse…
I thank the Polish presidency for convening this meeting today. I remember that, only two weeks ago, Mr. President, we commemorated together the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Warsaw uprising. In the final months of the Second World War, 200,000 innocent men and women — most of them civilians — we…
I am pleased to participate in today’s important Security Council debate under the leadership of French Foreign Minister Le Drian. Sitting next to him here in the Council underlines how closely France and Germany are working together as Council members in advancing multilateralism and cooperating on…
Conflicts are part and parcel of the Security Council’s day-to-day business, but we do not often have the opportunity to take a step back and consider the causes of those conflicts. I would therefore like to thank you, Mr. President, for inviting us to do that today.
I would like to tell members of…
A veteran of United Nations diplomacy recently told me that every session of the General Assembly has its own crisis to discuss, its own major topic. So what is the big issue in 2018? Syria? North Korea? The Middle East? Or the dramatic global refugee situation, from the Mediterranean to Venezuela?
…
I would like to thank the President of the General Assembly for convening today’s meeting, which could not have come at a better time.
The international community is facing many conflicts and problems. We all know the main ones: climate change, forced displacement, migration and terrorism, to name …
I wish to thank Prime Minister Rutte for organizing this important debate on peacekeeping. I would also like to thank the Secretary- General for his briefing. I am honoured to be here today, just days after assuming my new office.
Collective action is crucial for United Nations peacekeeping, as it …
