YouSaid · the spoken record

Sachs

lines on the record: 29
first: 2023-02-21
most recent: 2023-11-20
sittings or episodes: 2
sources: un-security-council

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

“I firmly believe in the capacity of the United Nations and the Security Council to keep the peace and to promote sustainable development. When all 193 Member States, or 194 with the membership of Palestine, live up to the United Nations Charter, we will have a new global age of peace and sustainable development.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“Directly across the street from us is Isaiah’s wall, with the visionary words of the great Jewish prophet of the eighth century B.C.E.: “[T]hey shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore” (The Holy Bible, Isaiah 2:4). It is time to honour Isaiah’s words by ending these useless and destructive wars, slashing military outlays and turning the savings into new investments in education, health care, renewable energy and social protection. As an American, I am proud that our greatest president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was the visionary who oversaw the establishment of this great institution.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“Thirdly, the peace and development fund would partner with other funding streams such as China’s Belt and Road Initiative, the European Union’s Global Gateway, the Group of Seven (G7) Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment and increased lending by the Bretton Woods institutions and the regional development banks, as the Secretary- General has called for in the Sustainable Development Goal stimulus. Interestingly, the fund for peace and development could be a vehicle for greater investment partnerships linking China, the EU, the United States and the G7. That too would be a contribution to peace, not only by ending today’s wars but by increasing cooperation among the world’s major Powers.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“If those countries were to reduce military outlays by just 10 per cent and redirect the savings to the peace and development fund, that alone would free up around $160 billion per year. Secondly, the fund would emphasize regional integration. That is paramount for both peacemaking and successful development. Ukraine would be helped to integrate both west and east. Israel, Palestine and Syria would all be helped to integrate into a network in the eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. The Sahel countries would be helped to overcome their isolation and lack of services through a network of infrastructure.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“I have mentioned several times the idea of creating a new peace and development fund that the Security Council could deploy to create positive dynamics for sustainable development and to work with investors such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, regional development banks such as the New Development Bank and others to coinvest in peacemaking. I would recommend three guideposts for such a fund. First, the major Powers would fund it by transferring part of their military outlays to global peacemaking. The United States, for example, now spends roughly $1 trillion per year on the military sector, while China, Russia, India and Saudi Arabia are the next biggest spenders, with their combined military expenditures at roughly half of that of the United States.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“The Security Council is vested with considerable powers by the Charter of the United Nations when it has the resolve of its members. It can introduce peacekeepers and even armies if necessary. It can impose economic sanctions on countries that do not comply with its resolutions. It can provide security guarantees to nations. It can make referrals to the International Criminal Court to stop war crimes. In short, the Council is certainly able to enforce its resolutions if it chooses to do so. For the sake of global peace, let the Council now choose to end those wars. The Council can also bolster its toolkit by engaging in economic peacebuilding alongside the more usual decisions on borders, peacekeepers, sanctions and the like.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“Here too — and perhaps more than in any other region — the Sahel needs external funding to make the transition from war to peace and from extreme poverty to sustainable development. All of the members of the P5 — and indeed the whole world — have suffered adverse consequences from the continuation of those wars. All countries are paying a price in terms of financial burdens, economic instability and risks of terrorism and wider war. The Security Council is in a position to take decisive actions to end these long-standing wars, precisely because it is clear that it is in the interests of all Council members — and notably all the P5 — to bring them to an end before they escalate into even more dangerous conflicts.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“Their poverty alone made the Sahelian countries highly vulnerable to an influx of armaments and militias. The result has been ongoing violence and multiple coups, gravely undermining the possibility of economic improvement. The countries of the Sahel form a natural aggregation for regional economic investment in infrastructure. The entire region urgently needs investments in electrification, digital access, water and sanitation and road and rail transport, as well as in social services, notably education and health care. Since the Sahel is one of the poorest regions in the world, if not the poorest, the Governments there are utterly unable to finance the needed investments.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“On the economic side, Syria’s best hope is to become closely integrated into the eastern Mediterranean and Middle East, especially through the construction of physical infrastructure connecting Syria with Turkey, the Middle East and the Mediterranean nations. The war in the Sahel has similar roots. Just as the regional Powers and the United States aimed to overthrow the regime of Bashar Al-Assad in 2011, the NATO Powers similarly aimed to overthrow the regime of Muammar Al-Qaddafi. In pursuing that aim, they grossly overstepped the mandate of the Council’s resolution 1973 (2011), which had authorized the protection of Libya’s civilian population but certainly not a regime change led by NATO. The violent overthrow of the Libyan Government quickly spilled over into the impoverished countries of the Sahel.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“The Syrian war broke out in 2011 when several Powers in the region, together with the United States, joined forces to topple the Government of Syria’s President Bashar Al-Assad. That deeply misguided regime-change operation failed, but it triggered a prolonged war with enormous bloodshed and destruction, including of ancient cultural heritage sites. The Council should make it clear that all the P5 countries, and the countries in Syria’s neighbourhood, are in full agreement that all attempts to achieve regime change have now permanently ended and that the Security Council intends to work closely with the Syrian Government on reconstruction and development.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“Such an outcome would respond to the overwhelming will of the international community and would be in the manifest interests of both Israel and Palestine, despite the vociferous objections by hardline rejectionists on both sides of the divide. An economic strategy should accompany the political strategy. It is vital that a new sovereign State of Palestine be economically viable, and I give several examples of how that can be done. But most importantly, both Israel and Palestine should become part of an integrated sustainable development plan for the eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East that supports climate resilience and the region’s transition to green energy. Similarly, the Council could end the war in Syria.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“In my view it is therefore high time for the Security Council to enforce its decisions by implementing a just and lasting solution that is in the interests of both Israel and Palestine, rather than allowing hardliners on both sides to ignore the Council’s mandate and thereby threaten global peace. My recommendation to the Council is that it immediately recognize the State of Palestine in a matter of days or weeks and welcome Palestine as a full member of the United Nations, with its capital in East Jerusalem and with sovereign control over the Islamic holy sites. The Council should establish a peacekeeping force drawn heavily from the neighbouring Arab countries to help provide security in Palestine.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“To consider the war in Israel and Palestine in a similar way, there too the war could be ended quickly if the Council enforced the many resolutions it has adopted over several decades — including resolutions 242 (1967), 338 (1973), 1397 (2002), 1515 (2003) and 2334 (2016) — that have called for a return to the 1967 borders, an end to Israel’s settlement activities in the occupied territories and the establishment of a two-State solution. It is clear that Israel and Palestine have been unable to reach agreements that are in line with those resolutions. On both sides, hardliners repeatedly frustrate moderates, who seek peace based on a two-State solution.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“On the financing side, Ukraine will need funding for reconstruction and for new physical infrastructure, such as fast rail, renewable energy, 5G and port modernization. As I will describe, I recommend that the Security Council establish a new peace and development fund to help mobilize the financing to help Ukraine and other war zones turn away from war towards recovery and long- term sustainable development.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“On the political front, the countries of the five permanent members of the Council (P5) should agree to extend a security guarantee to Ukraine while also agreeing that NATO will not expand to Ukraine, thereby addressing Russia’s concerns over NATO enlargement. [RO] The Council should also work to achieve ...The Council should also work to achieve a lasting governance solution regarding Ukraine’s ethnic divisions. On the economic side, there are two considerations, one in policy and the other in finance. On policy, Ukraine’s strong economic interest is to join the European Union, while also maintaining open trade and financial relations with Russia and the rest of Eurasia. Ukraine’s trade policy should be inclusive rather than diversionary, allowing Ukraine to serve as a vibrant economic bridge across eastern and western Eurasia.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“When the EU tried to negotiate a free trade agreement with Ukraine, Russia expressed alarm that its own trade and investments in Ukraine would be undermined unless a three-way agreement was reached among the EU, Russia and Ukraine to ensure that Ukrainian-Russian trade and investment would be sustained alongside EU-Ukrainian trade. That is a well-known event in trade negotiations. Unfortunately, the EU was apparently not prepared to negotiate with Russia over such a three-way arrangement, and the competing east-west orientation of Ukraine’s economy was never resolved. The Council could end the Ukraine war quickly by addressing its underlying political and economic causes.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“Following the overthrow of President Yanukovych in 2014, ethnic Russian regions broke away from the post-coup Government and appealed for protection and autonomy. The Minsk II agreement, endorsed by the Council in resolution 2202 (2015), called for regional autonomy to be incorporated into Ukraine’s Constitution, but the agreement was never implemented by Ukraine, despite the backing of the Security Council. The economic cause of the war results from the fact that Ukraine’s economy faces both west to the European Union (EU) and east to Russia, Central Asia and East Asia.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“The other reason why those wars could end quickly is that they result from economic and political factors that can be addressed through diplomacy rather than through war. By addressing the underlying political and economic factors, the Security Council could establish conditions for peace and sustainable development. Let me briefly consider each of the four wars in turn. The war in Ukraine has two main political causes. The first is the attempt by NATO to expand to Ukraine, despite the timely and repeated objections by Russia. Russia considers NATO presence in Ukraine as a significant threat to Russia’s security. The second political cause is the east-west ethnic division in Ukraine, partly along linguistic lines and partly along religious lines.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“Mr. Sachs: Today’s meeting takes place at a time of several major wars. In my testimony, I will refer to four of them: the Ukraine war, which started in 2014 with the violent overthrow of Ukraine’s President Viktor Yanukovych; the Israel-Palestine war, which has flared repeatedly since 1967; the Syrian war, which began in 2011; and the Sahel wars, which began in 2012 in Mali and have now spread throughout the Sahel. Those wars may seem intractable, but they are not. Indeed, I would suggest that all four wars could be ended quickly by agreement within the Security Council. One reason for that is that major wars must be fed from the outside, both with external finances and armaments. The Council could agree to choke off those awful wars by withholding external finance and armaments. That would require an agreement among the major Powers.”
2023-11-20 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9482 (2023) · source
“A Security Council objective investigation of the Nord Stream terrorism, in which all countries contribute what they know, is important for the global confidence in this body and, most important, for global peace and sustainable development.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“I hope that the United States, together with all other Security Council members, will condemn this act of international terrorism and join together in an urgent Security Council-led investigation of this international crime in order to determine the truth. The truth is not yet known by the world, but it is knowable. More than ever, the world depends on the Security Council to do its work to stop the escalation to a new world war. The world will be safe only when the permanent members work together diplomatically to solve global crises, including the war in Ukraine and the rising tensions in East Asia. The Security Council provides the unique global venue for that peace-affirming work. More than ever, we need a healthy, functioning Security Council carrying out the mission assigned to it by the Charter of the United Nations.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“again, then there will be no longer Nord Stream 2; we will bring an end to it.” When asked by the reporter how he would do that, he responded, “I promise you we will be able to do it.” On 30 September 2022, immediately following the terrorist attack on the pipeline, Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared that the destruction of the pipeline is “also a tremendous opportunity; it’s a tremendous opportunity to once and for all remove the dependence on Russian energy and thus to take away from Vladimir Putin the weaponization of energy as a means of advancing his imperial designs.” On 28 January 2023, Under-Secretary Nuland declared, in testimony to Senator Ted Cruz in the United States Senate, “I am, and I think the Administration is, very gratified to know that Nord Stream 2 is now, as you like to say, a hunk of metal at the bottom of the sea.” Such language is not at all appropriate in the face of international terrorism.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“Senior United States officials made statements before and after the Nord Stream destruction that showed the United States animus towards the pipelines. On 27 January 2022, Under-Secretary of State Victoria Nuland tweeted, “If Russia invades Ukraine, one way or another, Nord Stream 2 will not move forward.” On 7 February, President Biden said, “If Russia invades ...”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“In the interest of global peace, the Security Council should require those countries to immediately turn over the results of their investigations to the Council. There is only one detailed account to date of the Nord Stream destruction, the one recently put forward by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, ostensibly based on information leaked to Hersh by an unnamed source. Hersh attributes the Nord Stream destruction to a decision ordered by United States President Joe Biden and carried out by United States agents in a covert operation that Hersh describes in detail. The White House has described Hersh’s account as “completely and utterly false,” but did not offer any information contradicting Hersh’s account and did not offer any alternative explanation.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“That also comports with the fact that Russia had no obvious motive to carry out this act of terrorism on its own critical infrastructure. Indeed, Russia is likely to bear considerable expenses to repair the pipelines. Three countries have reportedly carried out investigations of the Nord Stream terrorism, namely, Denmark, Germany and Sweden. Those countries presumably know much about the circumstances of the terrorist attack. Sweden in particular has perhaps the most to tell the world about the crime scene, which its divers investigated. Yet instead of sharing that information globally, Sweden has kept the results of its investigation secret from the rest of the world. Sweden has refused to share its findings with Russia and has turned down a joint investigation with Denmark and Germany.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“To do so undetected, in the exclusive economic zones of Denmark and Sweden, adds greatly to the complexity of the operation. As a number of senior officials have publicly confirmed, an action of this sort must have been carried out by a State-level actor. Only a handful of State-level actors have both the technical capacity and access to the Baltic Sea to have carried out this action. Those include the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, Poland, Norway, Germany, Denmark and Sweden, either individually or in some combination. Ukraine lacks the necessary technologies, as well as access to the Baltic Sea. A recent report by The Washington Post revealed that the intelligence agencies of the NATO countries have privately concluded that there is no evidence whatsoever that Russia carried out this action.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“The destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines required a very high degree of planning, expertise and technological capacity. The Nord Stream 2 pipelines are a marvel of engineering. Each section of pipe is made of rolled steel of 4.5-centimetre thickness, and with a pipeline internal diameter of 1.15 metres. The pipe is encased in concrete of 10.9-centimetre thickness. The weight of each section of concrete-encased pipe is 24 metric tons. The Nord Stream 2 pipelines, some 1,200 kilometres in length, contain around 200,000 pipes. The pipelines sit on the sea floor. Destroying a pipeline of heavy rolled steel, encased in concrete, at depths of 70 to 90 metres, requires highly advanced technology for the transportation of the explosives, diving to install the explosives and detonation.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“They include not only the vast economic losses related to the pipelines themselves and their future potential use, but also the heightened threat to transboundary infrastructure of all kinds: submarine Internet cables, international pipelines for gas and hydrogen, transboundary power transmission, offshore wind farms and more. The global transformation to green energy will require considerable transboundary infrastructure, including in international waters. Countries need to have full confidence that their infrastructure will not be destroyed by third parties. Some European countries recently expressed concern over the safety of their offshore infrastructure. For all of those reasons, the investigation of the Nord Stream explosions by the Security Council is a high global priority.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source
“Mr. Sachs: My name is Jeffrey Sachs. I am University Professor at Columbia University. I am a specialist in the global economy, including global trade, finance, infrastructure and economic Statecraft. I appear before the Security Council on my own behalf. I represent no Government or organization in the testimony that I will deliver. The destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines on 26 September constitutes an act of international terrorism and represents a threat to the peace. It is the responsibility of the Security Council to take up the question of who might have carried out the act, in order to bring the perpetrator to international justice, to pursue compensation for the damaged parties and to prevent future such actions. The consequences of the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines are enormous.”
2023-02-21 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.9266 (2023) · source