YouSaid · the spoken record

RAJARATNAM

lines on the record: 254
first: 1969-09-24
most recent: 1979-09-24
sittings or episodes: 9
sources: un-general-debate

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Mr. President, first of all may I, on behalf of my Government and of my delegation, extend our felicitations to you on your being elected President of the twenty-seventh session of the General Assembly? We would also like to associate ourselves with the tributes paid to you by the many distinguished speakers who have preceded me. Permit me also to express my delegation's appreciation of the exemplary manner in which your predecessor, the distinguished Foreign Minister of Indonesia, Mr. Adam Malik, presided over the twenty-sixth session last year. 28. I should also like to take this opportunity to welcome our new Secretary-General. His ability, his wide knowledge of the ways of men and nations, and his fortitude will, I feel, be put to the severest test that any Secretary-General has yet undergone.”
1972-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 27 (1972)
“This is the only practical strategy for the survival of small nations in the multi-polar world that is now emerging.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“So an obsession with economic development is necessary for our survival as small nations. 69. When this happy condition has been reached, then small nations stand a better chance of resisting attempts to convert them into pawns in the game of great Powers. Most important of all, without the co-operation of small nations, the great Powers, confronted with the awful alternative of direct confrontation in pursuit of power politics, may finally be forced to abandon power politics as a method of conducting international relations. 70. So in a way, we, the small nations, can bring power politics to an end by first concentrating on internal development and by steadfastly refusing, like the Trojan women in the Greek play, to enter into any cold-war liaison with the major Powers.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“That is why it is vital for the small nations of the third world to approach the problems of economic development with a new sense of realism and with the utmost urgency. Past policies in regard to economic development must be abandoned simply because they have clearly failed to provide results after a period of 25 years. 68. So, for a start, we should develop an obsession about economic development. True, there is more to life than economic development. But the time to think of these higher and nobler aspects of existence is when elementary decencies of life have been assured to a majority of the peoples of the third world. Only then can we think of the more spiritual aspects of our lives. True, man does not live by bread alone, but without it he does not live at all.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“There can be no unity, stability or modernization in the third world unless there is an economic breakthrough. Clearly, all the remedies and policies attempted during the past 25 years to promote rapid economic development have fundamentally been in error. That is why we still remain under-developed, in fact more under-developed with every passing year, because while we grow poorer, the wealthy nations are growing richer and more powerful every day, every year. The gap between the rich and the poor nations is widening at such a rate that if it is kept up for another two ox three decades, the under-developed countries may be doomed to live in permanent bondage to the advanced nations. 67. Time, therefore, is not on the side of the third world.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“We cannot build immunity against manipulation by great and wealthy States so long as we remain economically weak and are beset by all the ills of under-development. We will remain weak and easy prey for big-Power manipulation so long as we persist in promoting what has been described as ineffective under-developed revolutions. 65. According to the Secretary-General's report on children, there are more sick and more undernourished children in the under-developed world today than was the case 10 years ago. Human misery is progressively increasing in the third world; more people starve and more die of preventable diseases because the reproductive capacity of the peoples of the third world is increasing faster than their economic productivity. 66.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“Once that happens, these wars can be ended only by the leave and license of the big Powers and only when they have attained their somewhat different objectives. 64. So if the small nations are to prevent their becoming expendable pawns in the big-Power game, they must first put their own houses in order. As long as we are internally weak, we are easy prey for big Powers. A major source of internal weakness is our failure to promote rapid economic development. The only successful revolution that the third world has so far waged is the anti-colonial revolution. It was by any standard a great revolution. But we have been far less successful in bringing about the economic revolution so necessary to build strong modem States.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“This will be all the more so because we, the small nations, are either unable to resist being made pawns in the power game or because we unwittingly provide ample opportunities for big-Power intervention and manipulation. We, the small nations, are rent by internal dissension, civil wars, crushing economic problems and often inter-State conflicts, degenerating into endemic wars. These are all irresistible opportunities for successful big-Power intervention, often disguised as sympathy and aid for our respective causes. 63. But once local conflicts are meshed in with big-Power conflicts, then these wars cease to be small wars to further the ends of small nations. These small wars pass into the hands of competing big Powers.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“The small nations are more than ever before necessary instruments for big-Power conflicts-the only available instruments for big-Power conflicts. 61. I personally do not believe that small wars or limited wars are all that safe. They may be so in the short run, and in a bipolar world. But in the long run, in a multi-polar world, limited wars must escalate into unlimited wars. Small Powers can acquire a significance and involve considerations of big-Power prestige which may make it impossible for a major Power to accept defeat even in limited wars. But there is little evidence at the present time to show that the big Powers are convinced of that. For the immediate future, small countries would increasingly be made the battlegrounds for big-Power conflicts because great Powers believe small wars to be safe wars. 62.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“Small wars have in the nuclear age become the only safe method of conducting big-Power conflicts. That is why today and for the past decade small wars are and have been gradually increasing; that is why the third world is the scene of growing violence and conflict and civil wars. Textbooks on military strategy refer to this as the strategy of fighting limited wars. They have developed a strategy; textbooks refer to it as the strategy of fighting limited wars. It also includes the promotion of wars of national liberation, support for guerrilla uprisings, subversion and the engineering of coups in small countries. 60. So long as power politics persist, small nations will, I am afraid, increasingly be made the battlegrounds for resolving big-Power conflicts. A multi-polar world will possibly increase the risk of small wars breaking out.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“That is because the development of nuclear weapons has forced a tacit agreement among the nuclear Powers that there should be no direct confrontation between them because in nuclear terms that would mean the mutual annihilation of the great Powers. But they know that conflicts between big Powers are inevitable so long as the drive for power and dominance remains the overriding consideration in international relations. But they will be waged by means other than direct confrontation. 59. And the means are the small nations. Big wars can be and have been fought through small nations. The idea is not really new. In the past, small nations have been pitted against one another to further the interests of great Powers. But today the technique of wars with small nations as proxies has been more systematically developed.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“The shift from a bipolar to a multi-polar world has, it is true, ended the danger of the carving-up of the world by only two great Powers. To a great extent, that offers the small nations greater room for maneuver, a greater range of choice. But it also carries with it new dangers. Where before we, the small nations, were subjected to pressures by two Powers, we are in future going to be exposed to the blandishments of three or more great Powers. 58. I do not foresee the great Powers abandoning power politics in the near future. That is because the great Powers believe they have evolved techniques for conducting power politics safely, without danger. I do not believe that in the long run that technique is really safe. But it is enough for our purposes that the great Powers believe it to be so.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“But with the entry of China into the United Nations arena the familiar bipolar world comes to an end and with it the equilibrium-of-sorts that world has established. In other words, the cold war involving only two great Powers has come to an end. We now see looming ahead prospects of a new tri-polar cold war. Looking a little further ahead, it is more than possible that two other dormant Powers Japan and a united Western Europe will enter the arena of great-Power struggle. They too will, as is natural to great Powers, seek to shape the world in the light of their own particular ambitions and national interests. In other words, in the 1970s the small nations must learn to live and survive in a multi-polar world of power politics.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“But, most important of all, the politics of the United Nations will be dominated, not by two, but by three major nuclear Powers. That has great implications for the small nations, in particular those of the third world. Hitherto we have had to contend only with the ambitions and rivalries of two nuclear Powers. It was a difficult enough task for small nations not to be caught in the cross-fire. There were moments of great danger for us, and even a few casualties, as we learned through trial and error how to cope with the cold war of an essentially bipolar world. But over the years the small nations have learned how to deal with two Powers, just as the two great Powers have developed their own expertise in the art of coping with small nations. 57.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“But we cannot deny that during those 26 years it has discharged its responsibilities towards this Organization constructively, responsibly and judiciously. 55. It is for that reason that we regret very much that the Albanian draft resolution [AIL.630 and Add.l], with whose essential points we whole-heartedly agree, should contain elaborations that are unduly harsh and unnecessary. 56. The entry of the People's Republic of China into this Organization will make for a different kind of United Nations from the one we have known for the past 26 years. For the first time in 26 years the United Nations will feel the impact of new approaches and new attitudes to world problems. That will impose new strains on the Organization. New problems will emerge.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“We have always maintained the view that the seat allocated to China should properly be occupied by the People's Republic of China. We also subscribe to the view that there is only one China and that Taiwan is a part of it. We can hold no other view, since the Governments of Peking and Taiwan themselves have consistently maintained this view. That being so, the status of Taiwan is a domestic matter to be settled by the people of China, including those of Taiwan. 54. Having said that, I should like to add that my delegation has no intention of joining in any denigration of a Government that has for 26 years represented China in this Organization. We may disagree as to whether it should have continued to represent mainland China after it lost control over it.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“The danger becomes more compelling now that Communist China has emerged as a nuclear Power as well. 51. I am well aware that the debate on the China issue at this session will not be all plain sailing. It was cold war considerations which had for so long kept Communist China out of this Organization. One should therefore not be unduly dismayed if, at its final stages, this question should still betray old fears and ancient animosities. 52. But we should not allow what is undoubtedly a triumph of common sense and wise diplomacy to be marred by efforts to present the final outcome as a triumph for one side or a capitulation by the other. Therefore I should like at this juncture to state my country's position in regard to the issue of China. 53.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“49. I do not wish to go through the list of many other allegedly unsolvable problems before us which we have accumulated over the years. The point I want to make is that the China problem demonstrates that, given the will, the irresistible can give way and the immovable can move. There are really no unsolvable human problems. 50. The participation of the People's Republic of China in the work of our Organization will at last make it truly representative of nearly all of humanity. The exclusion of some 700-800 million people-a quarter of mankind-from the community of world nations has not only made the United Nations that less representative of mankind but has also threatened international stability by compelling a quarter of mankind to work outside the framework of the United Nations.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“However, the problem of white racialism must be understood and attacked within the wider context of racialism in general. It is a depressing fact that manifestations of racialism are no longer a simple conflict between the white and black races. Racialism is increasingly becoming a world-wide plague. It afflicts not only the underdeveloped world but the developed world as well. We all know that there is oppression of blacks by whites. But there is also oppression of blacks by browns, of browns by blacks, of yellows by browns, of whites by whites, of browns by browns, and any other chromatic combination we care to think of. 48. So we of the third world cannot successfully fight white racialism if we ourselves indulge in that indefensible vice. Racial oppression cannot be fought on the basis of discrimination, as regards Color struggles.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“My Government is well aware that there still exists a gap of suspicion and fear. But we believe that renewed war will not narrow the gap, and will most certainly erode the area of agreement so painfully and patiently broadened through peaceful negotiations. 45. My Government would like to reiterate that the Middle East conflict should be resolved through negotiations and on the basis of Security Council resolution 242 (1967). 46. A more intractable problem which comes regularly before this Assembly is that of white racialism in South Africa and Rhodesia. The ritualistic condemnation of white racialism, though necessary, will not., it is now clear, by itself bring that evil to an end. Black Africa must first manifest a unity and strength sufficiently credible to compel white Africa to come to honorable terms with the Colored majority. 47.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“It is a war that has continued more or less uninterrupted for some 30 years involving first the Japanese, then the French, and now the United States. But even here there is, at last, sound reason for optimism. The desultory talks in Paris and the United States decision to disengage as soon as possible from the war in Viet Nam are indications that the Viet-Nam problem is not unsolvable. It is senseless to persist in a war where clearly one side cannot defeat the other. It is an outrageous fact that more than half of the population now living in Viet-Nam was born in war and has never experienced peace. 44. The other apparently unsolvable problem is the tragic war in the Middle East. Here, too, there are grounds for at least qualified optimism. The area of agreement between the parties concerned has now been hopefully widened.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“We are now very close to demonstrating that the unsolvable is solvable. This is a momentous discovery, and one of great significance to an Organization only too ready to be convinced that difficult problems are unsolvable. This happy outcome to the China problem would, I hope, at least shake our faith in the existence of unsolvable problems. Problems may be difficult, complex and delicate, but they are not unsolvable. This is because all the problems that come before this Assembly are wholly man-made and therefore well within the capacity of men to resolve. 42. If the China question, long accepted as unsolvable, can be solved, then so can the many other allegedly unsolvable problems which are now permanent fixtures of our agenda. 43. There is, for example, the war in Viet-Nam.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“A depressing feature of our Organization has been the steady accumulation over the years of problems designated as unsolvable. We have consequently developed rigid conventions as to their treatment. Year in and year out these questions are solemnly unwrapped before this Assembly, given an airing and returned to the catacombs more or less undamaged. 40. The China question was one such unsolvable problem. For over two decades it was a "must" on our agenda. Though no solution was expected, it was nevertheless debated, if only to justify our expensive trips to New York. The speeches on the China question have over the years acquired the irrelevant abstruseness of debates by medieval European theologians wrangling over the number of angels who could dance on the point of a needle. 41. Now, after 21 years, the log-jam has been broken.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“Equally notable has been the single-mindedness with which you have espoused the cause of regional co-operation by helping to establish the Association of South-East Asian Nations or ASEAN. It is therefore fitting that you should have been chosen to preside over one of the most important sessions in the history of our Organization. 38. Permit me also, Sir. to pay a tribute to our distinguished Secretary-General, who has for 10 years been performing what has been described as the most impossible job in the world. His integrity, his dedication to the Charter and his techniques of quiet and patient diplomacy have added new dimensions to the office of Secretary-General. We are grateful to him for a decade of impeccable service to the United Nations, which we would have liked to see continue if it were possible. 39.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“37. First of all, Mr. President, permit me, on behalf of my Government and the delegation of Singapore, to congratulate you on your election to the important office of President of the twenty-sixth session of the General Assembly. Your election to this high office is all the more gratifying to us not only because we both come from the same region but also because Indonesia is our next-door neighbor. My country therefore derives some vicarious pleasure from being able to bask in reflected glory. As for your qualities of leadership and statesmanship, these have been amply demonstrated in the many years you have devoted towards the creation of an independent and progressive Indonesia.”
1971-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 26 (1971)
“That, in conclusion, is the measure of the real and significant problem before the less developed countries.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“But we of the less developed countries cannot afford to take that philosophical attitude, because the rate of progress — economic, social and technical — in advanced countries is reaching geometric proportions; and if we remain quiescent in the face of this, then the difference between us and the advanced nations may be as qualitatively different as that between Stone Age man and modern man. 129. The validity of this contention is not something which will be put to the test only many generations from now. I think it will be put to the test when those now in their teens in less developed countries reach maturity by the end of this century. Whether this emerging generation is put into new bondage will depend, to a great extent, on what those of us now in charge do or fail to do. 130.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“If we can develop that potential, which in effect means undertaking the difficult and painful process of modernization, then, collectively, what are now the under-developed nations can pass meaningful resolutions. The price of modernization will be a heavy one, because the major burden of the cost must be borne by us. 128. I do not propose to try your patience further by a dissertation on modernization through self-help and mutual aid between developed and under-developed nations. I should like, however, to end with the warning that the affluent countries have developed a more philosophical attitude towards the widening gap between the rich and poor nations. Maybe they hope that this widening gap itself will afford them protection against the consequences of a largely impoverished and desperate third world.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“When it comes to the decisive moment of plunge, the potential rescuer makes a realistic appraisal of his capacity to stay afloat himself, let alone rescue friends True, there have been cases where valour has had the better of discretion, with the result that very good friends, of both advanced and less advanced nations, have regrettably and irretrievably been lost. 127. In making this realistic, if somewhat unpleasant, assessment of the capacity of under-developed nations to play a role in world affairs, I am not suggesting total incapacity or permanent impotence. On the contrary, I believe that we have the potential to exert a substantial and beneficial influence on the course of human affairs, because we constitute the overwhelming majority of mankind.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“The capacity of the developed countries to determine at least the pitch and intensity of expensive, mechanized, modern wars in other peoples’ territories is, if not decisive, at least considerable. 126. The independent role that less developed nations can play in these kinds of situations is, at best, marginal. Before we of the less developed countries can play a more independent role in world affairs, we must first build up the political, economic and technological resources of a truly modernized community. That is why calls to less developed countries to jump into stormy seas to rescue friends, as often embodied in Assembly resolutions, remain in fact unanswered.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“If a determined minority can impose its immoral doctrine on millions of people, then it should be possible for a determined majority to convince the minority of the utter futility of persisting in its present course. 125. That is why my Government remains unconvinced that these and other important issues will be settled wholly, or even primarily, by the speeches less developed countries make or the resolutions they endorse in this Assembly. The ultimate and effective decisions must be taken by the parties directly involved in such conflicts and by the big Powers, which, we all know, have a special position in regard to those conflicts. The big Powers and some of the advanced nations are not innocent bystanders in regard to conflicts involving less developed nations.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“Something more compelling than the ritual of resolutions in this Assembly is required to persuade the white Aryans of South Africa and Southern Rhodesia, not that their doctrine is immoral — for they well realize this — but that their long-term security and prosperity would be in jeopardy were they to persist in their racial arrogance. Until the white Aryans of South Africa and Rhodesia can be convinced that racialism carries within itself the seeds of their own destruction, through the mobilization of black Africa, no less determined to end racialism than the whites are to sustain it; moral exhortations, by themselves, will not materially alter the present convictions of the white racist minorities.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“My Government believes that the Security Council resolution of 22 November 1967 [242 (1967)] provides the basis for a peaceful solution and, further, that the continued resort to force would only make more difficult the resolution of that conflict. 123. In regard to Viet-Nam, our belief is that the future of that country, for which World War II never really ended, should be settled by the people of that nation through the free expression of their wishes along the lines of the Geneva Agreement of 1954. 124. As regards white racialism in South Africa and Southern Rhodesia, its arrogance and confidence have grown rather than diminished, despite the fierce postures taken in this Assembly.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“I should, however, like to make particular reference to three of them, not only because my Government is specially concerned with them but also because they involve grave issues of peace and war for the world. These are the war in the Middle East, the war in Viet-Nam and the manifestations of racialist imperialism in South Africa, South West Africa and Rhodesia. My Government has already made public its stand on these matters. 122. In the case of the Middle East conflict my Government believes that no country, however big or small, should be denied the right to exist; that the fruits of conquest, however achieved, should not be forcibly converted into fruits of war, and that peoples who have lived for long as a settled community in a territory should not be made into homeless wanderers.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“The advanced nations may be taking a short-sighted view of their real interests, for in this shrunken and interdependent world the widening gap between rich and poor nations cannot, in the long run, make for a peaceful, progressive or even a prosperous world. Even if the advanced nations are prepared to lend a helping hand this will, at best, be only a supplement to what we should do for ourselves. 121. We have before us a number of undoubtedly important issues. Most of these have been with us for a considerable time and my Government has, on previous occasions, expressed its considered views on those specific topics. I shall not, therefore, tax your patience by repeating them. They remain conveniently enshrined in the reports of this Assembly and all I therefore need do is reaffirm our attachment to views already proclaimed.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“Second, I myself have as yet no specific and clear-cut proposals as to how the less developed nations can carve out for themselves a meaningful role in world affairs, other than by passing resolutions which, like Omar Khayyam’s philosopher, come out by the same door as in they went. Perhaps when we meet next year to commemorate the twenty-fifth year of the United Nations it may be worth our while to undertake a positive and constructive approach as to how small and developing nations can play a satisfactory role in the shaping of world affairs. 120. But of one thing I am fairly certain. We cannot rely, as we once did, on the advanced nations to be all that concerned with our salvation.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“The advanced countries and the big Powers no longer need this Assembly — at least in the way they once did — to resolve their differences or pursue their major national objectives. The votes and the support of the less developed nations are therefore not that vital; hence our leverage against them is far weaker than it was two decades ago. It will become even more feeble unless we of the less developed nations begin a brutally frank reassessment of our real position and our real influence. I do not propose to suggest the lines along which that reassessment should move. First, it is too complex and also too delicate a question to be thrashed out in a single speech or even a succession of speeches. 119.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“Their speeches were listened to with unrelenting attention by the advanced nations, not so much for the pearls of wisdom which might be cast but to determine whether it was the East Wind or the West Wind which was blowing strong in this Assembly. I am not making any moral judgement. Since the big Powers had foolishly decided to convert the United Nations into an arena for their cold war manoeuvres, the smaller nations, understandably, tried to secure the maximum advantage for themselves out of a situation which, after all, was not of their making. 118. All this I am afraid is now in the past. Today a somewhat different situation confronts the less developed countries. The techniques of cold war have changed significantly.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“Perhaps the most pertinent reason why the advanced nations once courted us with such flattering ardour was the fact of the cold war. Those were the halcyon days when the advanced nations, in particular the big Powers, believed that the decisive battlefield of the cold war was the United Nations. Both communist and anti-communist protagonists believed that significant defeats and victories could be secured by appropriate resolutions in the United Nations. So the combatant who could mobilize the greatest number of votes for his cause felt he had the edge over his rival. 117. It was not surprising that the less developed nations were courted and humoured.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“During that time, too, some of the new nations have lost their innocent looks and built up records which make our moral strictures less compelling to the reprobates of the old world. We must also remember that, in the intervening years, a new generation has grown up in the advanced countries which has no guilty conscience about imperialism because it did not participate in its iniquities, and which believes that its guilty elders have already performed due deeds of atonement. This new generation of men whose influence is growing in their respective countries is too interested in fighting poverty in its own homeland to be concerned with eradicating it in the third world. It is more interested in financing the second industrial revolution in its own country than in initiating the first in the less developed countries. 116.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“In the years immediately after the end of the war, the advanced nations, having just concluded a barbaric war, were morally in a defensive, if not apologetic, mood before the new nations, which, being new, had no comparable record. Our moral strictures in regard to the iniquities of imperialism probably instilled a guilt complex among the advanced nations. In that frame of mind they were perhaps a little more disposed towards placating their former victims and even towards disbursing conscience money in the form of aid and loans. 115. However, more than two decades have passed since decolonization began and 20 years is a long time in which to nourish a guilt complex.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“There was a time when the more advanced nations courted the less developed countries with greater zeal than they do now. 113. Our exhortations, whether moral or condemnatory, were listened to by the great and advanced nations with apparent respect and rapt attention. There were then solicitous offers of aid and great regard for our sensibilities and even our whims. All these might have contributed towards the great illusion that the big and small nations, developed and less developed countries had an equal say in the disposal of momentous world issues. 114. I would humbly suggest that the great deference shown by the high and mighty and the special care they took to extend to us the courtesies of equality were largely due to a fortuitous combination of historical needs and circumstances which, unfortunately, have now largely vanished.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“In theory, we are all equals in this Assembly regardless of our size, our power, our effective economic resources and the quality of our respective societies. Our votes are equal and, therefore, mathematically speaking the less developed countries should have a preponderance of influence on world affairs through this Organization. But we know now that this formal preponderance of power is largely illusory because there is not the substance of power behind this preponderance of mere numbers. 112. If I may slightly amend the phrase of the President, we are also prey to yet another mythology, the “mythology of the equality of nations”. Perhaps in the early days of this Organization there was a greater approximation between mythology and reality.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“If this is true, as I believe it to be the case, then the less developed countries, which constitute roughly 80 per cent of the world’s population and a majority of Members of this Assembly, should seriously ask themselves what role, if any, they would be allowed to play in world affairs? Is there not a real possibility that world problems, a great many of which would undoubtedly affect our future and which will have an impact on our domestic affairs, will more and more be settled over our heads by this free-masonry of advanced nations? 111. I think this danger is a real one which, in the course of the next decade or so, could reduce our so-called sovereignty into a shadow without substance. Maybe some of us have been prevented from facing up to this harsh reality by the formal equality accorded to us in this august Assembly.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“In fact, the less developed countries should wake up to this new and significant development in international affairs, which is that the advanced nations, and in particular the big Powers, are setting up a separate international network of their own, where decisions of greater consequence than resolutions passed by this Assembly are being made and implemented. While we of the less developed countries delude ourselves into believing that our perorations, admonitions and resolutions are influencing the course of world events, the reality is otherwise. Increasingly, it is in this separate international network, this new freemasonry of big Powers and advanced nations, that the significant decisions on world issues, whether they be political, economic or military, are being taken. 110.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“I would like to stress here that a vigorous and effective United Nations is more vital to what are described currently as the less developed countries, the LDCs, than it is to the more developed. This is not to suggest that the developed countries are uninterested in the United Nations or have no further use for it. But they need its services far less than we of the less developed countries do. The advanced countries can and often de operate, in regard to world affairs, without reference to this Organization.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“They were never in the first place put through the sieve of what is possible and not possible; what is practical and not practical. 108. My observations so far might appear to be unnecessarily querulous and in accord with the current fashion of denigrating the United Nations as an expensive white elephant the world could do without. Let me assure you that this is not my intention. It is because I sincerely believe the United Nations is indispensable for the peace and security of the world, and has such great potentialities for good that even if the present Organization were to collapse it would be necessary for mankind to erect another one, that I experience a sense of exasperation at our inability to put the existing Organization to better and more profitable use. 109.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“I would, therefore, humbly suggest that this Assembly shift its attention from resolution-making to problem-solving. True, we cannot do without the making and passing of resolutions. They are the necessary rituals of organized activity. But resolutions are declarations of intentions and not substitutes for action. In fact, every resolution which is not acted upon weakens an organization. Where resolutions are formulated primarily with a view to pleasing friends or discomfiting enemies, internationally or domestically, then resolutions become impediments to action, That is why attempt must be made to relate a resolution to the realities out of which the problem first arose. Our failure to do this explains why some of the resolutions passed by our Organization have an air of unreality and impracticability about them.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“However, it would appear that ‘with successive reincarnations of a persistent resolution our faith in this particular form of black magic is proportionately reinforced. One could not otherwise explain the presence of what I would call veteran questions which do not show signs of ever dying on their feet. If there are doubts about the efficacy of resolution-making, it is attributed not to the procedure of resolution-making but to its phraseology. So, we spend a great deal of time phrasing and rephrasing resolutions through an endless permutation of words. We become so preoccupied with the phrasing of a resolution that the problem which gave rise to the resolution is lost sight of and even thrust aside as being something of a hindrance to the formulation of an agreeable and well-balanced resolution. 107.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)
“But it would appear that some of us harbour the illusion that their powers are unlimited, that once we have publicly declared our resolve on a matter, then a resolution can be relied upon, without any further assistance or action on our part, to resolve the problem for us. 106. The fact that it does not has not shaken our faith in this particular form of witchcraft. That is why an increasing number of problems, which we hopefully dispose of each year with appropriately worded resolutions, reappear, bloody but unbowed, the next year and succeeding years. One would have thought that this persistent reappearance of somewhat battered and battle-scarred resolutions would have caused us to re-examine, with some scepticism, the efficacy of the ritual of resolution-making.”
1969-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 24 (1969)