10 May 2016

To respond to both current and future threats to world peace and security, the United Nations must become more relevant, credible, legitimate and capable, by taking concrete steps that include finding political solutions to sustain peace, fostering partnerships for building prosperous and stable societies, and tackling terrorism and preventing violent extremism, the President of the UN General Assembly said today.

Speaking at the opening of a two-day High Level Thematic Debate on Peace and Security – whose theme is 'In a World of Risks: Today's Threats to International Peace and Security' – General Assembly President Mogens Lykketoft emphasized that while the UN has, in some respects, “delivered quite well,” it is clear that the Organization today remains insufficiently equipped to meet its overriding 1945 objective: to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.

“Today, 70 years later, we reflect on the times the UN has succeeded and failed in meeting that objective and we look to determine how it can do better, both today and into the future,” he said. “On this 70th anniversary year, however, following the recent reviews on peacebuilding, peace operations and women, peace and security, we have an opportunity to fundamentally change this reality. And thankfully we are in a good moment for multilateralism.”

Mr. Lykketoft praised the UN for providing a framework that has helped restrain the world's largest powers, mobilizing hundreds of thousands of peacekeepers and billions of dollars for peace operations, establishing a clear legal framework for the conduct of war and the protection of human rights, and helping to reduce the risks posed by the world's deadliest weapons.

“Of all of this, we should be proud,” he said.

“But, in other well-known instances, regrettably, the UN has performed very poorly,” he added, noting that despite significant advancements following the end of the Cold War, in Srebrenica, Somalia and Rwanda, when the UN was “perhaps needed most, it failed abysmally.”

Since then, the General Assembly President said, the UN's approach has evolved to help it respond more rapidly to potential massacres and to conflicts that have become “increasingly localized or internal in nature.”