YouSaid · the spoken record

Verhofstadt

lines on the record: 7
first: 2007-09-25
most recent: 2007-09-25
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: un-security-council

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“Let us arrest him and put him on trial and make an example of him, as a warning to all criminals that the exploitation of children in armed conflicts is not possible in this modern world.”
2007-09-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5749 (2007) · source
“An international arrest warrant has been issued by the International Criminal Court in The Hague. We know where he is, but nobody arrests him, while his activities continue to this day and the terror continues. Now, from the Congo, he and his troops regularly invade the southern Sudan, where more children are again kidnapped. The time for talking is over. Certainly, on this question - child soldiers - a time for action is here. We know what Kony has done; we know what he is doing and we know where he is, and there is not any possible pretext for him not to be arrested. I therefore ask individually, the members of the Security Council to do just that. We have the possibility; MONUC is in east Congo, and we know where Kony is.”
2007-09-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5749 (2007) · source
“First and foremost, what is needed is an embargo on the export of weapons to all the countries with child soldiers by means of a new international treaty on the arms trade. That is the best way to do it and to deal with it. Secondly, the international community must reach an agreement on stopping development aid to countries that use child soldiers in their army. The current naming and shaming system that exists inside our Organization is not enough. Offending countries must not only be named, or shamed, but must actually be punished. But above all, the offenders themselves must be put on trial. Take, for example, Kony, the so-called leader of the Lord's Resistance Army of Uganda. He alone has been responsible for the abuse of almost 70,000 child soldiers on the African continent.”
2007-09-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5749 (2007) · source
“After that, she was kidnapped, presented as a gift to an army commander and taken to the Sudan. They abused and raped her, and in the end she found a way to escape. In doing so, she shot one of her guards dead. The other guard shot her in the head, but she managed to get away. Finally, she was taken in by the army and treated in a hospital for her bullet wound. There, she was also found to be pregnant. I can tell you that Christine's story is just one of the many thousands of tragic, shocking tales of child soldiers on the African continent today. I believe that each one of them is a stain on the soul of human civilization - an unacceptable stain that politicians cannot and must not ignore. And I have three measures in mind to deal with the problem.”
2007-09-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5749 (2007) · source
“And it is also thanks to MONUC that the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for the first time in its history, was able to hold democratic elections. However, the battle is never over. The international community must remain vigilant regarding the resurgence of Violence, which is currently raging in the Kivus. (spoke in English) But I want to use - or abuse; I do not know which is the better word to use - this meeting to talk about one of Africa's greatest outrages: the problem of child soldiers in Africa. Today, there are 300,000 child soldiers in Africa, each of whom has his or her own horror story. If members will allow me, I should like to tell them one of those stories: that of Christine from Uganda, one of the children whom I have adopted financially. Kony's rebel army forced her to kill her own uncle when she was 14 years old.”
2007-09-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5749 (2007) · source
“However, the effort that we must make to improve the plight of all these children has never been so enormous. In fact, we must provide â‚¬60 billion. With such a sum, we could resolve all the basic problems in Africa. We could guarantee to each African access to clean drinking water, sanitation, basic health care and education. But we must recognize - and this is why it is very important that we are having this discussion here this afternoon - that the major obstacle to progress in Africa is war. So I am pleased that we have decided to send new peacekeeping forces to Darfur and the surrounding countries, as we did in, for example, the Democratic Republic of the Congo with the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC).”
2007-09-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5749 (2007) · source
“Mr. Verhofstadt (Belgium) (spoke in French): At the outset, I should like to say that I am very happy that we adopted resolution 1778 (2007) this morning. I can also announce that Belgium will participate in the joint peacemaking mission in Chad and the Central African Republic. Why? Because I believe that Africa, more than any other continent, needs particular and concerted attention from us. One out of every five children born in Africa today dies from a simple curable illness, hunger or malnutrition. Out of the four children who survive, two must do so on a dollar a day, and the third will never learn to read and write. That is the reality. Moreover, the chances are great that he or she will also have to engage in child labour. That is why we must act together for Africa.”
2007-09-25 · UN Security Council · Security Council, S/PV.5749 (2007) · source