UNITED NATIONS: US President George W. Bush and other world leaders scrambled yesterday to contain the fallout from the financial crisis engulfing Wall Street and sending shock waves across the globe.
In his farewell speech to the United Nations, Bush offered assurances of his commitment to stabilize world markets, which has been overshadowing international concerns about tense standoffs with Russia, Iran and North Korea.
But the president also faced criticism at the annual General Assembly gathering of world leaders over the excesses of global capitalism that Washington has long pushed as the path to economic growth and prosperity. Yesterday more than 120 heads of state attended the opening of the 63rd General Assembly.
The president of the 63rd General Assembly, Father Miguel d’Escoto Brockman, repeated a call for inclusiveness of the entire UN body in UN resolutions, rather than simply the Security Council, led by its five permanent members the US, France, Britain, China and Russia.
“A small group of states takes decisions based on selfish motives and the world’s poor are the ones who suffer the consequences,” said d’Escoto. “Decisions with most serious consequences for the membership do not go through the General Assembly. The resolutions of the General Assembly are casually ignored even though they represent the wishes of the 95 percent of the organization’s members.”
Seemingly agreeing with d’Escoto point, French President Nicolas Sarkozy argued that the 21st century world “cannot be governed with the institutions of the 20th century.”
Sarkozy called to enlarge the Security Council allowing more diverse voices to be heard and take part in decision-making.
“To all those who are hesitant, I wish to say that enlarging the Security Council and the G-8 is not just a matter of fairness, it is also the necessary condition for being able to act effectively,” said Sarkozy.
He suggested turning the G-8 into G-13 or G-14, bringing in countries like China, India, South Africa, Mexico and Brazil.
Bush spoke amid intensive efforts in Washington to craft an unprecedented $700-billion bailout spurred by the worst upheaval in the US financial system since the Great Depression.
“I can assure you that my administration and our Congress are working together to quickly pass legislation approving this strategy, and I’m confident we will act in the urgent time frame required,” Bush said.
But the main thrust of his speech, his eighth and final to the United Nations, was a call to redouble the international fight against terrorism — a focus Brazil’s president said was regrettable given the severity of the financial crisis.
Speaking a few miles from Wall Street, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said financial turmoil endangers efforts to cut world poverty and demands a new approach with less “uncritical faith in the ‘magic’ of markets.”
His words resonated with delegates of leftist governments that have long opposed the neo-liberal economic orthodoxy the Bush administration has advocated.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, a former labor leader with close ties to Washington, blamed the crisis on speculators. “We must not allow the burden of the boundless greed of a few to be shouldered by all,” he said.
Reflecting the depth of concern among dozens of world leaders assembled at UN headquarters, Lula gently chided Bush for not devoting more of his speech to what the US government is doing to curb the financial meltdown.
“He opted to talk again about terrorism,” Lula told reporters. “I was expecting he was going to talk about the economic crisis, because I think this is the most important thing at this moment.”
Sarkozy called for a summit of world leaders by year’s end to address the financial crisis.
“Let us build together a regulated capitalism in which whole swathes of financial activity are not left to the sole judgment of market operators,” he said.
Bush reasserted accusations that Iran and Syria sponsor terrorism — charges they deny — and urged UN member states to enforce sanctions against Iran and North Korea over their nuclear programs.
Bush renewed US support for Georgia, which Russia invaded in August after the former Soviet republic tried to retake control of its pro-Moscow breakaway region of South Ossetia. But Bush was less strident in his criticism of Russia than he had been previously. “The United Nations Charter sets forth the equal rights of nations large and small,” he said.
Answering one of the reporters’ questions of a possible meeting with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Sarkozy said that he does not wish to meet with Ahmadinejad because of his hatred toward Israel.
“It’s difficult for me to take the hands of a man that said ‘I want to wipe out Israel.’ I have certain convictions and that statement is unacceptable,” said Sarkozy.
Meanwhile, the Security Council will likely hold a meeting, called by the Saudi Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal, regarding Israeli settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories. Arab News has learned that this Security Council meeting will most likely take place tomorrow but it’s not clear yet if it’s going to be on a ministerial or mission level.
On Friday, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) member states are going to hold a meeting to discuss food security and Islamophobia, according to OIC Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, who added that the OIC is trying to pass another resolution in this GA regarding religious defamation against Islam.
With regard to the situation in Sudan, he said: “I think we have to be a little bit more prudent and I sense it’s the emerging consensus among international organizations we must give a chance to Sudanese government to take more actions before international community heads to a point we might regret.”
— With input from agencies
