YouSaid · the spoken record

Kravchanka

THE RECORD WRITES THIS SPEAKER AS KRAVCHANKA

lines on the record: 99
first: 1991-09-24
most recent: 1993-09-24
sittings or episodes: 3
sources: un-general-debate

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“Standing on the threshold of the third millennium, one can hardly envisage all of the details of the general picture of the future world. However, the prospects that lie ahead are what matters most, and they are clearly visible. From the role of cease-fire organizer to the role of peace guarantor, from the role of peace guarantor to the role of co-organizer of life in the international community, a wise and authoritative arbitrator whose political will is without doubt recognized by all: that is the way we see the role of the United Nations in the next century. Meeting the challenges of the time, Belarus is ready to work together with other friendly States, including, if this is the will of the General Assembly, within the Security Council of the United Nations.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“We support priority consideration of ecological problems within the context of international cooperation, and the Republic of Belarus supports the idea of transforming, in the near future, the Commission on Sustainable Development into the United Nations council on ecological security. We are ready to contribute to the elaboration of its structure and mandate. The United Nations is moving from the old epoch to the new one with an imposing baggage. Certain parts of it have already become obsolete and will be of interest only to historical researchers; others contain the grains of that new future role to be played by the United Nations in this quickly evolving world which I have already spoken about - for example, a positive and future-oriented experience of large- scale peace-keeping operations in Namibia and Cambodia.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“We support efforts to elaborate an international convention on desertification; the search for a solution to the problems of the small developing island States; and the search for new and additional resources for developing countries. Aware, under the conditions of post-Chernobyl realities, of the significance of ecological problems in finding a solution, Belarus has been actively supporting the implementation of the decisions and recommendations of the first-ever summit in history held in the interests of the Earth. The Parliament of the Republic of Belarus has already ratified the Convention on Biological Diversity and is now examining the issue of acceding to the Convention on Climate Change.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Indeed it is immoral to fail to take note of this. I am convinced that the new world order will entail a fairer distribution of the world’s wealth and it will be marked by assistance to those who for decades have been unjustifiably doomed to poverty, stagnation and predictable backwardness and have had to be content with the remaining crumbs of the wealth produced by them but then redistributed and not in their favour. As one of the original members of the Commission on Sustainable Development, our country is striving to 30 General Assembly - Forty-eighth session contribute to its work in a way that reflects the ecological and economic interests of all groups of States in a balanced manner.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“In the post-Chernobyl era we need moral and psychological support, sometimes simply compassion. In this connection I should like to recall the words of a great Russian writer, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, who is connected to Belarus by birth. He once declared that beauty and the nobility of human relations would save the world. To that I would add compassion because they in effect are inseparable since beauty is always noble while compassion and nobility are always beautiful. Belarus, living through the post-Chernobyl nightmare, having over centuries survived the nightmare of many raids, invasions and wars, poverty and hardship, understands the pain, the suffering, of the peoples of the developing countries as no other country does. Poverty, diseases, child mortality, in many parts of the world cannot leave people of good will indifferent.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“We call upon the United Nations, in close cooperation with the Commission of the European Communities, to continue their efforts to further study and overcome the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster. We hope that in the process of reforming the United Nations system and its Secretariat the necessary institutional and programme mechanisms will be worked out to further carry out Chernobyl-related activities in the interests of the entire international community, taking into consideration the great significance and uniqueness of the lessons of the Chernobyl tragedy. The activities carried out by the new United Nations Coordinator on Chernobyl, Mr. Jan Eliasson, the beginning of whose work is greatly appreciated by us, gives us hope that the United Nations potential will be used actively enough to yield tangible practical results.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“At the beginning of my statement I mentioned the great hopes for the future which Belarus places on United Nations activities. However, there is one very special area for us in which United Nations assistance is vitally important, and that is the environment and our "eternal wound that does not heal" - Chernobyl - the most terrible nuclear disaster. Along with the growth of cancer, especially among children, of great concern to us recently has been the social and psychological stress among our people. The birth rate has fallen dramatically and the number of psychogenic diseases has been growing rapidly. People are overwhelmed by a concern about their health and the health of their children. This has also affected the pace of the Republic’s transition to new social and economic realities.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“We are well aware of the acuteness of the financial situation of the Organization. That is why, despite our own extremely difficult economic and financial situation, the Government of Belarus recently made a contribution amounting to $3.5 million to the budget of the Organization and, in effect, has fully settled its arrears. I wish to assure Members of the United Nations that we will continue to do what we can within our very limited resources. But the United Nations itself through its main organ the General Assembly must take steps to have the financial obligations of Belarus strictly match our real capacity to pay. In particular the new realities warrant a decision without further delay on the relocation of our country from Group B to Group C in the scheme of the apportionment of expenses for United Nations peace-keeping operations.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“This opens up favourable prospects for the economic stabilization of the Commonwealth of Independent States and for the gradual overcoming of the most acute problems of this transitional stage. I am convinced that the agreements reached in Moscow will mark a transition towards radically new relations, that is, market relations, and will inevitably lead to the formation on that basis of the eastern European commonwealth, a geopolitical and economic group of a market type that will gradually, but at the same time consistently and unswervingly, become integrated into European and world economic structures. These new prospects encourage us also because they will help Belarus, I hope, in the near future to strengthen its real capacity to pay and settle to a large extent the problem of our financial obligations to the United Nations.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Belarus is striving to lift barriers and limitations in the field of trade and has taken a decision to start negotiations on its accession to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). We also hope that very soon the Uruguay Round will be successfully completed. Forty-eighth session - 29 September l993 29 Integration on a new level of economic activity within the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) is especially urgent for us. Belarus was one of the main initiators for setting up an economic union within the framework of the CIS and of concluding an appropriate agreement to that effect. It is with great pleasure that I state that an agreement on setting up such an economic union was signed recently, under the chairmanship of Mr. Shushkevich, in Moscow at the meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the CIS.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“The adoption of these legislative acts, like the laws on property, entrepreneurship, and foreign investment, has created the basis for the further development of market relations. Right now Belarus is on the threshold of a wider stage of its privatization. The Republic of Belarus, like other States of this region, is vitally concerned about developing and strengthening multilateral cooperation in the economic field. We believe that there are forms of discrimination and limitation with respect to the States of Central and Eastern Europe which should, along with the cold war, become a thing of the past. Any delay here will be at variance with the political and economic realities of the world.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“But at the same time we are far from being indifferent to the treatment of Belarusians who live beyond our national territory and will continue in future to follow closely the situation of more than 2 million ethnic Belarusians who live in different countries of the world. Economic reforms are gaining ground in the Republic. A gradual movement towards a market economy has increased the level of openness of the economy and has limited the State’s monopoly in a number of areas of life. Concrete steps towards creating a private sector have been taken. The law on private landed property, which is of fundamental importance in this respect, has been in force since 1 September.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“As early as 1991 we ratified the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and recognized the competence of the Human Rights Committee, in keeping with article 41 of the Covenant. Belarus commends the results of the second World Conference on Human Rights, held this year in Vienna. The Conference in particular reiterated the obligations of States to ensure completely and effectively all human rights and fundamental freedoms without any discrimination whatever against persons belonging to national minorities. We attach great importance to this provision. Belarus has created and is still creating all the necessary conditions for national minorities that live in its territory so that they can fully enjoy human rights.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Specifically, we are moving towards the development and implementation of the principles of democracy. The Belarus Parliament is in the final stages of considering our new Constitution, which will consolidate the irreversibility of the democratization of our State. We are building a new political structure: new political parties, national, social and political movements, and hundreds of civic organizations have been officially registered and have begun their political activities. Among these organizations is the League for the Protection of Human Rights. The evolving human-rights status of Belarus is up to international standards.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“For example, we sincerely wish to help settle the problem of Nagorny-Karabakh. Belarus remains ready to assist in convening the international conference on Nagorny- Karabakh, under the auspices of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), to be held in our capital, Minsk, on a date to be determined by the participants. We believe that the neutrality proclaimed by Belarus is an international asset. This constitutional objective enables us to adopt a wider, unbiased approach to determining our positions on various issues. We do this taking due account of the realities of today’s world and of our place in that world. We strive to pursue our policies in such a way as to lay the foundation for a prosperous and neutral Belarus.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“It was tolerance in the highest sense of the word that made possible a recent handshake, which finally opened the way to what had seemed the impossible: a Middle East settlement. It is tolerance that will determine the success of the process under way in South Africa, and it is a lack of tolerance that is delaying the settlement of the crisis in Bosnia. Instability; ethnic and religious clashes; ethnic and regional separatism; internal political strife: they have all reached tragic levels in the post-Soviet areas. In a number of cases, they have grown into local military conflicts, and even wars. The internal stability of Belarus and its position at the centre - serving as host to the coordinating bodies of the Commonwealth of Independent States - give Belarus the potential to be a peacemaking mediator in such conflicts.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Not a single drop of blood has stained the soil of Belarus during this difficult time of transition. We shall continue to do our best so that Belarus, nestled in the very heart of the European continent, can continue to set an example of political, ethnic and religious balance. Belarus is unique in its humanistic spirit, which can guarantee stability and irreversible democratic reform, and 28 General Assembly - Forty-eighth session we sincerely offer to the Security Council our experience of coexistence among different ethnic groups and the centuries- old tradition of national, cultural and religious tolerance that is a feature of our country. I am sure that tolerance can be an important key to the resolution of any conflict. With international effort, we can succeed.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Having lived over the centuries through the horror of numerous wars, and having lost in their flames millions upon millions of its citizens, the Republic of Belarus will do its utmost to ensure that the firestorm of military confrontation will never again consume its territory. I shall deal now with ethnic conflicts. Acute and bloody ethnic, religious and intercommunal clashes have become a dangerous feature of the new world. The deep, often irrational, roots of these conflicts pose an especially difficult challenge to the entire international community, for they do not respond to simple prescriptions for settlement. In Belarus, profound social transformations are taking place against a background of unique mutual tolerance among varied ethnic, cultural and religious groups within our society.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“In reducing its conventional weapons, Belarus is guided by the interests of all, and is entitled to expect reciprocity from other States in overcoming its difficulties. On the whole, the heritage of the former Soviet Union has been a difficult one: an economy among the most highly militarized, and large military contingents. Suffice it to say that at the start of 1992 there were three times as many soldiers and officers per thousand civilians on our territory as there were on average in the USSR. Working sincerely to keep Belarus neutral, our Parliament and our Government have adopted a policy intended to demilitarize the national economy, including a 50 per cent reduction in our army over five years and the development and adoption of a defensive military doctrine.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Now, Belarus is making an enormous contribution to strengthening regional and international security by destroying the weapons of what was the most powerful military tank district in the former Soviet Union. We are doing this with extreme difficulty, because of the problems of the present transitional period. I would note that this often results in a lack of understanding among our own people: during an energy crisis, we are destroying tanks while we lack the energy resources to carry out our crop- sowing campaign. Weapons are immoral, just as the Moloch of war is immoral. But the process of disarmament has turned out to be far from idyllic: a catch-phrase of our century - "Guns before butter" - has been fulfilled in a most unexpected way, for the destruction of the guns has done nothing to increase the supply of butter.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Yet we now have more tanks per capita than any other European State - another part of the difficult heritage of the former Soviet Union. When we decided to accede to the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe, we knew full well that Belarus would have to eliminate 1.7 times more tanks than the United States, 10 times more than the United Kingdom and 50 times more than France. That disproportionate burden is not taken into consideration in the Treaty, since the Republics of the former Soviet Union had no opportunity to participate in its preparation. At stake, however, was the fate of a highly important international agreement on which many European countries had been working for more than 20 years, and so as not to torpedo all that work and set Europe back many years we undertook that excessive burden, at great cost to ourselves.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Other initiatives put forward by my country are no less familiar to the United Nations. After many years of effort by Belarus, there has been agreement on international machinery that has the potential to prevent States from replenishing their arsenals with new types of weapons of mass destruction. During this session we intend to continue our active work in this area. Taking an authoritative position on these issues, Belarus, on behalf of and on the instructions of the States of the Commonwealth of Independent States, intends during this session to present a joint declaration by the Commonwealth of Independent States on issues of the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems. I turn now to reductions in conventional weapons. Our country does not manufacture battle tanks, and never has.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Having put forward from this lofty rostrum in 1990 the idea of creating a non-nuclear belt from the Baltic to the Black Sea, we have, to the best of our abilities, been transforming our territory into part of such a belt. We hope that in due course our idea will be supported and developed by our neighbours. Of great concern to the international community is the threat of illegal exports from the territory of the former Forty-eighth session - 29 September l993 27 Soviet Union of nuclear materials, technology and equipment, which can fall into irresponsible hands. Responding to this danger, Belarus was the first State of the region to enter into a large-scale agreement with the United States to set up a stringent system for export control. Work on implementing this agreement is already under way.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“I wish to emphasize that since May 1992 - that is, since the signing of the Lisbon Protocol - we have never given any grounds for anyone to doubt the honesty, logic and consistency of our actions. Of all the States which are the nuclear heirs to the Soviet Union, Belarus was the first, and still the only one, to have rejected nuclear weapons in practice. Moreover, it did so without any preconditions or reservations. Thus, for the first time in the history of the international community, a sovereign State has voluntarily renounced a real opportunity to possess and develop nuclear potential. This is truly a large-scale contribution by Belarus to global security and the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. I wish to emphasize once again that our words and deeds are not at variance.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Belarus, however, renounces the prestige of a nuclear State, the sword of Damocles referred to here by President Clinton, and has chosen non-nuclear status. Having made the appropriate commitments, we are fulfilling them in practice. In 1992 we were the first to remove tactical nuclear weapons from our territory; in fact, that was done ahead of schedule. Last February, the Parliament of Belarus virtually unanimously ratified the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I) and the Lisbon Protocol to that Treaty, and also took the decision to accede, as a non-nuclear State, to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. In July of this year the instruments of accession were deposited in Washington, Moscow and London.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Historical circumstances are such that the experience and the potential of Belarus, at this very difficult moment in the formation of a new world order, can be of great importance to the international community. Let us take a look at this experience and potential in those areas which have become very important for preserving global peace and security, as is widely recognized and attested to even by this current debate. I deal first with the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. As representatives are aware, Belarus is one of the four States that inherited strategic nuclear potential from the former Soviet Union. In our case, this is an important modern arsenal located in the heart of the European continent on mobile strategic missiles. It directly affects global security, the nuclear balance and nuclear non- proliferation.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“The new historical conditions which led to the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States, with Minsk as the host city for its coordinating organs, have made us take a fresh look at our role and at our possibilities of participating in the life of the international community. This is also attested to by the joint support of the Commonwealth and of a number of friendly States for Belarus’s candidature for non-permanent membership in the Security Council. For us, the submission of the candidature of the Republic of Belarus for membership in the Security Council does not represent merely a spontaneous political gesture nor a hankering for pro-forma prestige.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“The Republic of Belarus, as representatives know, is one of the candidates for a non-permanent seat on the Security Council for 1994 to 1995. Today, on the eve of the golden jubilee of the United Nations, the fiftieth anniversary of its creation, it is appropriate to recall that at the time of the inception of the World Parliament back in 1945, Belarus was a founding member of the United Nations, having been among the first to sign its Charter. It is appropriate to recall here that we have gained a certain amount of experience through working in the Security Council from 1974 to 1975. It is also true that we have been represented in that important body the fewest number of times compared to our friends and colleagues in the regional group, but we hope that this injustice will be redressed at the forthcoming elections.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Naturally, reforming the Council, including expanding its membership, requires an especially responsible approach. Mindful that in these new conditions, this most important United Nations body cannot remain the same as it was designed and created almost half a century ago, we support a careful search for consensus on all issues related to its reform. Changes in the Security Council - especially today, when its work has become much more intensive - should not hamper the productiveness of its efforts. To a large extent these efforts depend, in our view, on well-coordinated activities among all of the Council’s 15 members, on their adherence to the purposes and principles of the Charter of the Organization and on their highly conscientious, responsible attitude, proved, through real deeds, to the entire international community.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“Undoubtedly, the new role of the United Nations requires a new level of efficiency in the Organization, particularly in its main bodies - the Security Council and the General Assembly. The Republic of Belarus supports the reforms aimed at helping the Organization adapt to the fundamentally new realities and making the procedures of its main bodies more democratic. But in surging forward, one should not lose contact with the ground under one’s feet. Reforms, responsibilities and the future are those reference points on which we believe we should constantly focus our attention. 26 General Assembly - Forty-eighth session At this decisive moment, the Security Council is becoming the centre of attention, like a magic crystal ball in which one can discern the future.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“I believe that this organizing role of the United Nations is more lofty, more significant and more realistic than the one formerly assigned to it in the post-war decades, which in fact was unfeasible in the context of confrontation between the super-Powers. It is precisely this role for the United Nations in a new world that the Republic of Belarus advocates most actively. It is at this precise moment that the potential of both the United Nations Charter and the Organization itself as a centre for harmonizing and coordinating the action of nations is being realized. The United Nations, as the Secretary- General, Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, has emphasized is truly becoming irreplaceable.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“But the establishment of a new world order is not as painless as one might imagine. Changes in the balance of power and the dynamism of international relations often mutate unforeseeably into chaotic scenes of tense contradiction and conflict. World Powers, alliances of States and newly emerged countries are searching for their identity and rethinking their role in an entirely new world. Not always can an organizing vector or a system of values, guidelines and ideas inspiring all of us be felt in this world. In this situation, there is a new perception of the potential role of the United Nations.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“With our own eyes we have seen the huge tectonic plate of the cold war, with its intense confrontation between two super-Powers and two ideologies, sink into the past. Living space for a new world order has been opened up. What will it look like? The end of the last century was filled with dire forebodings reflected in a surrealistic quest, and those forebodings have, unfortunately, been borne out. The difficult twentieth century has become the century of confusion for the human soul and human society, and of the extreme tension of antagonisms that have many times brought civilization to the brink of destruction. Today feelings and expectations are different. At the end of the century, it would seem, the foundation is being laid for harmonizing new ways of life in the international community.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“I wish sincerely to congratulate the representative of Guyana on his unanimous election to the distinguished post of President of the General Assembly at its forty-eighth session. This is an expression of great respect for him and his country. I cannot fail to note the enormous amount of hard and complicated work, deserving of the highest appreciation, that Mr. Stoyan Ganev, a representative of the friendly, fraternal Bulgarian people, carried out in that post. We welcome and congratulate the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Monaco, Andorra and Eritrea, which have this year become Members of the United Nations. The end of the twentieth century will undoubtedly go down in history as a time of tectonic shifts in international relations.”
1993-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 48 (1993)
“We look forward with confidence to the new horizons now opening, we are ready to work indefatigably for our homeland, to make the life of the people of Belarus prosperous and secure, and we shall continue to make our contribution to the world community's constructive efforts. We are making our choice. We have made it already.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“Furthermore, we are prepared to assume financial obligations, but, first and foremost, we are prepared to do so only in respect of financial obligations as from the time of the juridical disappearance of the USSR, that is to say, from December 1991. The poetic metaphor of a crossroads, which is so dominant for Belarus today, involves another important symbolic feature, that of departing and leaving something behind. As it passes through the present difficult crossroads, Belarus leaves behind forever the obsolete ballast of implausible stereotypes that were imposed upon us, bound us hand and foot and prevented us from being free and happy.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“A number of United Nations administrative and budgetary policies also need to be seriously revised. First and foremost, the scale of assessments of the States Members of the United Nations deserves criticism. Regrettably, in the course of its recent work the Committee on Contributions recommended to the General Assembly that the share contributed by the Republic of Belarus to the United Nations budget should be sharply and substantially increased. The state of our economy, especially during the transitional period, gives no grounds for such an increase. We wish to declare our profound disagreement with such an unjustified approach, and we insist that the amount of our Republic's contribution to the Organization's budget should be reconsidered.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“Even the small secretariat that was established to oversee the implementation of that resolution is silently watching events from far-away Vienna, clearly not intending to relocate to one of the three capitals of the affected countries, closer to the scene. Apparently this is a much simpler and calmer way of proceeding. And what good would it do to try to take the Chernobyl issue outside of the United Nations, the United Nations General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council? It is evident that policy relating to Chernobyl is becoming hostage to the current weaknesses and the inherent characteristics of the United Nations. Need we explain why, in the light of this situation, the prestige of such a universal Organization as the United Nations may be waning in the minds of many people in Belarus?”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“The ineffectiveness of the United Nations, about which much has already been said from this rostrum, can be vividly illustrated inter alia by this example, which is particularly close and painful to us. We have learned from our own experience that resolutions in this particular case resolution 45/190, which was adopted by consensus and, I should point out, sponsored by 129 States - may be adopted, but the results of such seemingly active measures are minimal. The years that have elapsed since the disaster convince us that today we are essentially at the mercy of a capricious fate and must rely first of all on our own capabilities, on people of goodwill and on various international charitable and religious organizations, to which we are immeasurably grateful for their moral support and their assistance.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“Speaking from this rostrum as the representative of a country that was stricken by the worst nuclear accident in human history and of a State going through an extremely difficult stage in its transition from one type of economy to another, I must express today our anxiety concerning two aspects of the General Assembly's activities. The Republic of Belarus is troubled by the delay in the implementation of the General Assembly resolution on strengthening international cooperation and coordinating efforts to study, mitigate and minimize the consequences of the Chernobyl disaster - or, to be more precise, by the Assembly's almost total inactivity with regard to implementing that resolution.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“On the whole, Belarus' reserves of stability, both internally and on our borders, its traditions of cultural and national tolerance, its aspirations to the strict observance of human rights and its geopolitical position give it, in our opinion, the potential to play an active role as a peace-keeping mediator or coordinator in a number of situations, particularly in regions of the former USSR but also in a broader context. We are ready to make use of that potential in the interests of peace, cooperation and genuine respect for human rights. As we see it, the realization of this potential will be helped by another dimension in Belarus' foreign policy: our aspiration to balanced consistency, constructiveness and predictability of action.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“We highly commend the Secretary-General's report "An Agenda for Peace", and we are prepared to take part actively and as constructively as possible in discussing the recommendations put forward in that report. I can, however, declare even today our favourable attitude towards enhancing the activities of the United Nations in carrying out peace-keeping operations and, in general, in settling conflicts, many of which stem from inter-ethnic disputes. In particular, we are prepared to participate actively in the search for peaceful ways to resolve the Nagorny Karabakh conflict. We have agreed to hold an international conference at Minsk on this issue, and despite all our economic difficulties, we have done everything possible to enable it to begin its work.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“Belarus supports the idea of convening in 1995 the year marking the fiftieth anniversary of the United Nations - a special session of the General Assembly during which another summit meeting in the interests of the Earth would be held, for the first comprehensive review of the implementation of "Agenda 21", the agenda for the twenty-first century, and at which the Earth-95 Charter, which may be developed on the basis of the 1992 Rio Declaration, would be discussed. We regard the unique summit meeting of the United Nations Security Council, held on 31 January of this year, as a milestone in preparing the United Nations for its role, which is totally new in its effectiveness.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“Today, as never before, it is necessary to mount a multifaceted attack on world-wide economic problems. The removal of the threat of nuclear war and the growing burdens technology imposes on the global environment, which have reached and even exceeded the limit, have made clear the gravity of the problems that beset the environment. In this sphere too, the international community must choose not confrontation but cooperation in order to preserve the Earth's ecosystem. Without idealizing the results of the Rio de Janeiro Conference, Belarus shares the view that this is only the beginning of a long and difficult road. Here, in addition to everything else, it should be borne in mind that on the moral scale of values, the modest offerings of the poor are often much more precious than the donations of the rich.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“It is important, however, to enable the United Nations, through our joint efforts, to play an active, practical role in preventing conflicts and "extinguishing" those that nevertheless arise. At the present time it is both necessary and possible to strengthen the role of the United Nations in monitoring the compliance of States with their commitments under existing international covenants and conventions in the sphere of human rights. The issue of radically strengthening the role of the United Nations in this respect may become one of the items on the agenda of the World Conference on Human Rights, to be held at Vienna next year. It is essential to prevent the world from being split into groups on the basis of different degrees of well-being. Closed "oases of prosperity" cannot exist forever; they make the world unstable.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“It is true that the nuclear threat is receding, but the number of victims of conventional-arms conflicts is nevertheless terrifying. I am far from being a prophet of doom. Moreover, achieving our common strategic goal - the creation of a unified European home is a thoroughly realistic and attainable one. But we must not forget that the complications we face on the path I have just outlined are also real. We must see them clearly and overcome them in order to move forward through joint efforts towards our chosen goal. The main advantages of the new world order over that of the last century, in our view, lie in mankind's accumulated bitter experience, which we must prevent from recurring, and in the existence of a functioning and universally respected Organization of States whose task it is to ensure international peace and security.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“The creation of subregional groupings, such as the Little Entente, and an amorphous system of pseudo-collective security eventually demonstrated the complete inability of the League of Nations to function and failed to save the world from the conflagration of the Second World War. The situation today is similar in many respects. It is thought that unless urgent measures are taken, Europe will totally fail to approach complete prosperity and tranquillity. Internal tensions on the continent are increasing. A broader interpretation of CSCE is drawing it into new crises in the European-Asian area and making it more difficult to achieve any concrete results at the initial stage of emerging conflicts. Is it possible that we have not learned anything from the sad experiences of the past?”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“Paradoxically, the new pattern is reminiscent of the one that was laid down by the Vienna Congress and characterized the Europe of the nineteenth century, especially its latter half, with its multitude of centres of power and the abundance of inter-State and intra-State conflicts, often ethnic in content. No doubt the analogy is not exact, but its points of resemblance give cause for concern, a concern actively reinforced by the bloody conflicts in Yugoslavia, Nagorny Karabakh, Georgia and Moldova, all of which seemed inconceivable to Europe just a few years ago. And after all, we all recall the catastrophic convulsions with which that international structure ended at the beginning of the twentieth century. The political structure adopted thereafter was that of post-Versailles Europe, which also proved counterproductive.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“The time has come, however, to go both beyond mere declarations that changes have taken place and beyond simple-minded sentimentality at the sudden disappearance of earlier global tensions. It is true that the disintegration of the totalitarian system, both as a social and political system and as a system of States, has led to the actual disappearance of the central line of tension between the two opposing global military and ideological groups. One pattern of international relations, which characterized most of the twentieth century, is being or has been replaced by another. But this still does not automatically mean the absence of conflicts.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)
“This is demonstrated by the present-day situation in a multi-denominational Belarus, where a religious minority, the Catholics of Belarus, has been granted the right to celebrate its main religious holidays as officially established non-working days. If I am not mistaken, this is one of a very few such examples in Europe. It is our hope that the unique interfaith balance that has historically developed in Belarus will be valued and respected by all and will not become the subject of external manipulations. We in Belarus do not equate the religious denomination of the citizens of Belarus with the ethnic groups to which they belong. To say that we are living in an extraordinary time is nowadays often merely to mouth a cliche.”
1992-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 47 (1992)