President Joseph Kabila of the Democratic
Republic of the Congo (DRC) warned today that the selfishness of some
States could threaten efforts to set a new sustainable development
agenda for the decades ahead.
"At a time when the question of post-2015 development is high on the
agenda, the international community is more and more marked by the
failure of certain of its members to respect the fundamental principles
of international relations, the persistent selfishness of some States
and the convulsions of the world economy," he told the General Assembly
on the second day of its annual General Debate.
"The consequences that this entails are multiple. They range from
attacks against peace to murderous conflicts, from a globalization that
is essentially fuelled by the unbridled pursuit of profit to the
exacerbation of poverty."
President Kabila is one many leaders addressing the annual Assembly
session at which heads of State and Government and other high-level
officials will present their views and comments on issues of individual
national and international relevance. The Debate will conclude on 1
October.
The theme of this year's 68th Assembly is the post-2015 development
agenda, aimed at drawing up an even more ambitious blueprint to totally
eliminate poverty and its attendant ills in the decades following the
end of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) cycle.
The eight (MDGs), adopted at the 2000 UN summit, aim to slash extreme
hunger and poverty, boost access to health care and education, achieve
gender equality and environmental stability, and reduce maternal and
child mortality and the incidence of HIV/AIDS, all by the end of 2015.
"The new programme that we are called upon to set up must be
universal, ambitious, capable of responding to the immense challenges
that humankind confronts, and able to engender positive transformations
on the basis of the principle of shared and differentiated
responsibilities," Mr. Kabila said, stressing the importance of engaging
women, youth and civil society in the process.
"In this context, I hope that the proposals coming out of this
session will embody our common desire to prioritize the economic, social
and environmental dimension of sustainable development. These proposals
must cover local, national and regional development programmes. They
must also fuel a bold international cooperation and reflect the will of
each of our States to contribute to peace and international security."
Turning to his own vast country, where violence still continues in
the east despite the efforts of UN peacekeepers to bring stability over
the past 13 years, Mr. Kabila noted the irony that part of the problem
stemmed from the DRC's willingness to accept refugees in the wake of the
Rwandan genocide of 1994.
Without peace, sustainable development in the DRC remained "only
hypothetical," he said noting that the eastern region, particularly in
and around the flashpoint city of Goma, has seen little respite from
fighting since the peacekeepers helped bring relative stability and
elections to much of the rest of the country following vicious civil
wars. Mr. Kabila thanked the UN, regional African organizations and the
European Union for their aid and support.
He pledged his country's full support to the recently agreed regional
accord, formally known as the Peace, Security and Cooperation Framework
for the DRC and the Region.
