Statement by H.E. Dr Robert Golob, Prime Minister of the Republic of Slovenia, at the 79^th Session of the United Nations General Assembly General Debate

Mr President,

Mr Secretary-General,

Excellencies,

Ladies and Gentlemen.

It is my great honor to address the General Assembly today.

Colleagues,

Few days ago we adopted Pact for the Future. In these times of wars, climate catastrophes, increasing inequalities and deepening polarization, it was a rare flicker of unity. Unity of the countries and groups from all continents. The Pact should represent a start of a new era of global partnership of countries willing to strengthen the multilateral system with the UN at its core.

There was another flicker of hope this week. Security Council presided by Slovenia, my home country, adopted a Presidential statement on Leadership for Peace. All 15 members of the Security Council reaffirmed to maintain international peace and security and to commit to international law, including the UN Charter. It is a good start to re-energize our collective work for a better, more peaceful and more humane world.

Let me address some of the most pressing issues of today and start with with Peace and Security.

Secretary-General António Guterres who enjoys our full support and enormous respect, has repeated on several occasions that last year – with the highest number of conflicts in decades – was also the deadliest one.

Slovenia has been an elected Member of the Security Council since January. During this time, we have observed and witnessed gradual but steady erosion of power of rules. The Council is increasingly unable to respond in an effective way to major conflicts, such as Gaza, Ukraine or Sudan. And we are not doing any better in other crises managements.

What we are witnessing in Ukraine is aggression of a stronger, more powerful neighbor upon a smaller and weaker one. This is clearly a blatant violation of the UN Charter and if we are let this aggression to pass, we open the doors to many similar wars across the globe.

In Gaza, almost four months since the Council’s resolution on ceasefire and hostage release, the deal is nowhere close. As the Secretary-General said yesterday at UNRWA meeting, “people in Gaza are existing – not living, but existing – among lakes of sewage, piles of rubbish and mountains of rubble. The only certainty they have is that tomorrow is going to be worse.”

In the West Bank and East Jerusalem violence and dehumanization of Palestinians is increasing and has reached a boiling point.  All this is taking us further away from the two-state solution with Israelis and Palestinians living side by side in peace and security.

Escalation of Gaza crisis into the region is now a reality. The region is at a brink of an abyss. De-escalation is urgently needed, starting with the ceasefires in Gaza and Lebanon.

In Sudan we are witnessing a man-made humanitarian catastrophe, with millions displaced and in desperate need of humanitarian aid. At the same time, we are seeing the atrocity happening again in Darfur.

How is this possible?

Has the Security Council really failed the humanity?

To be honest, it is the permanent five Security Council Members who bear most responsibility. By misusing veto power and putting national interests first, they effectively blocked the working of the UN Security Council.

The concerns and pain that we feel for civilians, the condemnation of violations of the Charter and of international humanitarian law should not depend on our geographical or political proximity to the conflict.

We should all put common interests first and the world would be a much better place.

Having said that, let me come to the reform of the Security Council.

Our experience with the Security Council has given us renewed appreciation for the need to reform the Security Council. We urgently need a Council that is a true representation of the international community. A Council that is fit for the world of today.

We need to ensure that the distribution of the seats is fair.

The Council needs stronger voices of the regions that have been underrepresented, such as the African continent.

Reform of Council’s composition needs to be accompanied with the reform of the veto powers. The reality is that we won’t be able to eliminate veto but we could definitely regulate this right of veto more precisely.

The Security Council also needs to exercise its power with higher ambition when it comes to prevention of conflicts and play a stronger role in peace-building activities that involve all aspects of the UN system.

Colleagues,

Let us not forget that the United Nations are much more than the Security Council alone.

We commend the work of nameless humanitarian workers who are on the ground, in armed conflicts, among the civilians representing the face of the United Nations.

Erosion of respect of international humanitarian law is making their work so much more difficult. Gaza conflict was however a turning point in this regard.

In Gaza, humanitarians are not just occasional collateral victims. They seem to have become a deliberate military target. There is no other explanation for the highest number of humanitarian workers being killed last year, of whom a vast majority in Gaza.

The sense of impunity for crimes in Gaza is putting humanitarian organizations under stress elsewhere. This is undermining the very essence of the United Nations and it is affecting the work of the humanitarian organizations and agencies like ICRC and UNRWA all around the globe.

Third pressing issue – climate change.

The impact of climate change is mostly felt on the lifeline for people and nature – that is water, the most precious of the elements. Extreme weather events are multiplying water-related risks across the world. This global challenge demands a global and collaborative response. Solutions exist but are not equally accessible to everybody.

The UN Secretary-General’s “Early Warning for All” Initiative is the right step in this direction. As the catastrophic floods devastated my home country last year, we initiated development of an advanced digital solution linking Earth observation with supercomputing and artificial intelligence.

The system, when build, will help us predict floods and droughts and improve our resilience. We are ready to share this solution with our partners globally.

Remote sensing and Earth observation inform our early warning systems. But we are fully aware that many countries lack the capacity to monitoring all the hazards, and are restricted in their access.

I call upon all to form a global partnership around the Early Warning for All to help overcome these challenges. The partnership would boost our common preparedness and ensure that everyone on Earth is protected from hazardous weather, water, or climate events through life-saving early warning systems.

Unfortunately, people suffering from armed conflicts do not have the luxury of high-tech solutions. More often than not, they are denied basic access to clean drinking water. Even more. We are increasingly seeing how access to water is becoming weaponized: in Yemen, Somalia, Gaza, and Sudan.

Slovenia decided to take initiative and we launched the Global Alliance to Spare Water from Armed Conflict together with a cross-regional group of countries. Such global partnerships are urgently needed to safeguard the human right to water for all.

And last but not least – on Humanity.

We need to make sure that people around the world age with dignity and rights. The current international human rights law offers only a fragmented and inconsistent framework for the full protection of human rights of older persons. This is why we are leading a global action towards a legally binding instrument on human rights of older persons. 

The world should spare no time to address the main issues related to gender equality, including the future developments and implementation of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda. The UN should lead by example when it comes to the full, equal and meaningful role and leadership of women in our societies.

In its entire history, the General Assembly has been led by only four women. We never had a female UN Secretary-General. The time has come to reflect gender equality in top leadership positions of our organization.

Slovenia has joined the supporters of the Rotation for Equality Initiative, which calls for gender rotation in the position of the President of the United Nations General Assembly.

In the times of crisis, children are always the most vulnerable ones. Today’s world is increasingly hostile to children’s rights. More children than ever are experiencing violence in all settings, many have lost their lives, are forcibly displaced, exposed to most traumatic experiences, imprisoned, denied education and healthcare, and face extreme poverty and social exclusion.

Gaza is an example of extreme suffering of the children.  Slovenia is offering concrete help with the Foundation “Let them dream”, which is dealing with the rehabilitation of children from Gaza.

It is an extremely noble and human project, which was launched years ago and has already helped hundreds of children from Gaza who came on rehabilitation in Slovenia and will continue to do so. Sadly, some of these kids, were now already the victims of recent aggression on Gaza.

Let me finish with the story of the two young girls from Palestine. At the beginning of this week, I attended an event on Missing futures in the Occupied Palestinian Territory organized by Save the Children.

At this event I heard stories from two courageous girls Sara and Rand. They spoke about their challenges in life, they spoke about their feelings, they spoke about their plans for the future. In spite all of destruction, dehumanization and fear, there was no anger nor hate in their stories. They just had this enormous wish to live a normal decent life. They just had this enormous wish to be able to educate and study in order to be able to contribute back to their community. One wants to become a doctor, the second wants to become a humanitarian worker.

Today, I fulfill my promise to them and bring their story to the General Assembly. Only with our united call for peace and against war we could make sure that Sara and Rand and all the other children of Palestine and the world are not among the thousands missing futures of children under occupation.

I want to say this out loud and clear to the Israeli government:

Stop the bloodshed, stop the suffering, bring the hostages home and end the occupation.

Mr Netanyahu,

Stop this war now!

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