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Madam President,
We thank Sweden for organizing today's Open Debate and the insightful remarks made by Foreign Minister Margot Wallström.
We also thank Secretary-General António Guterres for presenting a set of inspiring ideas on how he plans to approach the broader issue of sustaining peace, including through greater focus on prevention.
We welcome and endorse the Secretary General’s call to make 2017 a year of peace and assure him of our full support and cooperation to translate this resolve into reality.
This is urgent given that new and complex conflicts are emerging even as older, longer standing and unresolved disputes continue to fester. We are, in fact, living in a world of turmoil, disruption and persisting instability.
We are witnessing unprecedented human suffering caused by conflicts and violent upheavals. Entire regions are being destabilized and millions of lives destroyed by long drawn out conflicts.
This debate is therefore both timely and critical.
Madam President,
The UN's responsibility for sustaining peace flows from the Charter's promise of promoting economic and social development for all peoples "in larger freedoms". This responsibility is in addition to the obligation for the maintenance of international peace and security.
The UN's peace building efforts must respect the fundamental principles of the UN Charter, including respect for the sovereignty and sovereign equality of states. These efforts should be undertaken under a clear mandate from the Security Council and the General Assembly.
Madam President,
The UN's capacity for sustaining peace is relatively nascent. It has been evolved in response to the growing number of conflicts across the world.
The UN's endeavors in nation-building have had mixed results. Yet, these have so far been more productive and cost effective than unilateral actions taken by some powers.
Madam President,
The review of the Peacebuilding architecture last year yielded a change in perception towards the concept of sustaining peace. The report of the Advisory Group of Experts and the resolution on the Peacebuilding architecture review clearly underscored sustaining peace as being the greatest challenge to the UN's peacebuilding activities.
The resolution simultaneously adopted by the General Assembly and the Security Council agreed that “sustaining peace” should be the overarching framework to guide national and international peacebuilding and prevention efforts.
Madam President,
Sustainable peace is a challenge and cannot be achieved unless the underlying causes of conflicts are addressed: poverty and, increasingly, environmental egradation; political and economic injustice; ethnic, tribal and religious tensions; and external interference and intervention. It also means addressing longstanding political disputes.
Political, security and development actors need to support each other in striving for sustainable peace. It is a comprehensive activity requiring holistic, long-term thinking that connects development, peace and security and human rights.
All our discussions from the past year have brought forth the understanding that sustaining peace entails a political process. It encompasses prevention of outbreak, escalation, continuation and recurrence of conflict.
Its core message is prevention. We believe that prevention should be taken as a task to be shared by national governments and national stakeholders. Inclusive dialogue, mediation, accountable institutions, good governance, access to justice, gender equality and youth participation all feed into the processes of conflict prevention and ultimately sustainable peace.
Inclusivity is the lynchpin for sustaining peace. We believe that only national actors can drive the processes for sustainable peace.
Madam President,
When we look at sustainable peace through the lens of conflict prevention then it is important to shift from a culture of reaction to a culture of prevention.
Effective preventive strategies rely on: one, early reaction to sign of trouble; two, efforts to alleviate the factors that trigger violence and; three, resolution of the underlying root causes of violence. In all these processes, national ownership is essential. We believe that conflict prevention and mitigation are not generic. Moving a country towards durable peace begins with a clear understanding of the sources and nature of local conflicts.
Ambitious conflict prevention strategies have to avoid the pitfalls of either a delayed reaction or reading incorrectly into signs of an impending conflict.
The UN already has several instruments for conflict prevention. At present, the UN and regional organizations maintain dozens of good-offices missions in or in proximity to countries faced with significant risks of conflict. Existing conflict-prevention mechanisms, such as early-warning systems, are mostly designed to detect only imminent or recurring conflicts. The UN's observer and peacekeeping missions should serve to provide a deeper understanding of potential conflicts and crises and act as early warning systems.
Madam President,
The United Nations cannot fulfill the role of sustaining peace and preventing conflict without adequate financial resources, the political support of Member States and efficient management and coordination by the several concerned UN organs and entities. This debate can contribute significantly to advancing these goals.
I thank you.