I wish to thank you, Mr. President, Deputy Secretary- General Fréchette and High Commissioner Robinson for their statements.
My Government has long believed that the safeguarding of civilians from the devastating effects of armed conflict is at the very heart of the United Nations Charter. In exami…
I think the Under-Secretary-General’s briefing and the discussion are interesting because they show that, while there are some differences and some new nuances in approach, the fundamental question that is still before us is whether unresolved issues in Kosovo and in the region will be solved or att…
I think there was a considerable amount of good and optimistic news in Mr. Annabi’s briefing. I, too, am grateful to him for reporting to us so early after his trip to give us a first-hand impression. There are a couple of points I want to flag and a couple of questions I want to ask.
We strongly s…
The United States cast this vote with great regret. It should not have been necessary, and this draft should not have been put to the vote. We wanted to support an action in the Council that advanced the cause of peace. For us, this is a matter of deeply held principle. But sadly, that is not what w…
I want to welcome Special Representative Haekkerup to the Council for the first time. He has my Government’s full support in his difficult mission.
We are obviously quite concerned about the violence in the region and its potential to disrupt and undermine what has been achieved in the past years a…
It is a pleasure to welcome Foreign Minister Kerim to the Security Council, although I wish it were under slightly happier circumstances, but it is good to have him here and to hear his views on the situation in his country and in the border area.
I will make my remarks brief, because there is litt…
It is a pleasure to see you here, Mr. President. Your presence testifies to the importance of our discussion today.
We are pleased to welcome President Kagame back to the Council and have listened carefully to his remarks. When the Security Council met with President Kabila five days ago, I said th…
I wish to congratulate you, Mr. President, for refocusing the attention of the Council on this important issue and for your concept paper, from which we can launch a substantive discussion. I also want to thank the Secretary-General for being with us today, and for his overview and his continuing ef…
Before I begin, I want publicly to recognize Tunisia’s extraordinary contribution to the cause of peace in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In addition to personnel of the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC), Tunisia has dedicated three of its fin…
The United States welcomes today’s Security Council consideration of the report of the Panel of Experts on Sierra Leone Diamonds and Arms. We commend the Panel’s Chairman, Martin Chungong Ayafor, and the other Panel members for their excellent work, completed under difficult circumstances.
My deleg…
I would like to thank Mr. Annabi for his informative briefing. I would also like to welcome Foreign Minister Svilanovic to the Security Council and thank him for his remarks as well. He raised a number of interesting points.
I would like to assure the Foreign Minister that the Council has very much…
The Council has acted wisely this evening on an ill-timed and inappropriate draft resolution. The draft resolution failed because it lacks sufficient support, as the vote shows. Had there been a chance of it passing, my delegation would have cast a veto.
The Council’s lack of support for and refusa…
The United States is pleased to support this latest expression of the Council’s efforts to improve the humanitarian situation of the Iraqi people.
We continue to believe that the oil-for-food programme is meeting the needs of the Iraqi people while denying the Baghdad regime access to funds it woul…
I would like to note at the outset that there has been no greater advocate for justice on this Council than the Netherlands, and my delegation and many others share the fundamental conviction that democratization and the pursuit of justice are fundamental pillars of our peacekeeping function.
I wou…
We would like to thank and commend the Dutch presidency for calling this important open briefing. In particular, I would like to thank the Dutch Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr. van Aartsen, for his thoughtful presentation, and also to thank the Secretary-General for his comments.
We applaud the c…
Today the General Assembly is discussing one of the most important — and frankly — one of the most vexing
issues that we face as Members of the United Nations. An impartial and dispassionate observer reviewing the record of the Open-ended Working Group and the General Assembly on this subject over …
I want to thank Under-Secretary-General Guéhenno for his excellent briefing.
We welcome reports that this election was free and fair, apart from some disturbing incidents in Srebrenica and the illegal campaign activity by the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ).
We are encouraged by the early results …
Today, the Security Council takes a critical step forward with the adoption of this resolution implementing the Brahimi Report’s core recommendations relating to the Council’s work. This reflects two months of hard work by the Council’s Working Group, under the extraordinary leadership and determina…
As this is Mrs. Ogata’s last briefing to the Security Council, I would like to begin by paying tribute to her for her leadership and commitment during the turbulent and difficult years of the 1990s. She so ably led her organization through the turmoil of northern Iraq, the Balkans, Rwanda, Timor and…
I want to welcome Mr. Petritsch back to the Council and to thank him for his thorough briefing on the progress his office has overseen to date in building a peaceful multi-ethnic society in Bosnia. That is a very difficult task, and we are encouraged by the positive developments noted in his report.…
