Meeting the challenges of the 21st century.

• Position: Albania through United States: Eastern and Western Europe, North America, Australia, part 3 - The Nations Speak

ALBANIA

Foreign Minister Alfred Serreqi said that both Serb and Greek nationalism were "seriously threatening the Balkans". Serb nationalism had launched an "aggression in the north" and a "war to realize a Greater Serbia by creating a real holocaust" against the Bosnian people and strengthening "apartheid in Kosovo". The Kosovo issue was not merely and solely a question of respect for the human rights of the 2 million Albanians--it concerned recognition of their "political self-governing entity", for which the Kosovo population had cast its vote in a democratic manner. He insisted that the lifting of sanctions against Serbia be conditioned on the settlement of the Kosovo issue. Greek nationalism--while making territorial claims against Albania--was trying to manipulate about 60,000 Greeks living there as a means of destabilizing the country and achieving its "annexationist designs".

ARMENIA

President Levon Ter-Petrossian stated that his country had no territorial claims against Azerbaijan. The conflict was between the people of the enclave of Nagorny Karabakh, who were striving for self-determination, and the Azerbaijani Government, which was refusing to address those rights. His country provided moral, diplomatic and humanitarian assistance to the enclave's people and could not accept a military solution which could only mean their "genocide or deportation". There was a "historic opportunity" today to end the conflict, but that required active, unified support of the international community, including the deployment of "international security forces". Armenia, despite numerous difficulties, was currently implementing "significant structural reforms" to create a "healthy market economy", which could flourish in a stable democracy. Today, his country had more than 30 registered political parties, had proclaimed freedom of the press, conscience and religion, and had laws guaranteeing civil and political rights.

AZERBAIJAN

President Heydar Alirza ogly Aliyev said that the Security Council's strong demand for the "immediate, complete and unconditional withdrawal" of all occupying forces from Azerbaijan had "so far been completely ignored" by Armenia, which was openly carrying out plans to annex his country's territories. Using the Nagorny Karabakh springboard, Armenian armed forces had occupied another six regions, "with a territory four times bigger than that of Nagorny Karabakh". After six years of war, more than 20 per cent of his country was under occupation, over 20,000 Azerbaijanis had been killed, some 100,000 wounded, 6,000 taken prisoner, and more than 1 million--about 15 per cent of the population--had become refugees and lived in tents. This was a gross violation of the independence of a UN Member State. Although the cease-fire had been holding, the situation remained complicated and the truce was "very fragile". Azerbaijan would provide guarantees to the Armenian population of the region; however, it considered its sovereignty and territorial integrity "eternal".

BELARUS

Prime Minister Mikhail Chygir supported broad cooperation and regional arrangements in such fields as peacemaking, disarmament, environment, anti-terrorism, drug control and industrial conversion. Peace-keeping should not overshadow the "crucial problems of socio-economic development". He favoured a UN conference on sustainable development in countries with economies in transition. For Belarus, transition to a market economy was "very difficult", especially in privatization, "fighting monopolies" and stabilizing the monetary-financial system. An "excessively large" military-industrial complex inherited from the former Soviet Union, long-term consequences of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, and a severe drought had prompted his country to elaborate a programme of measures to pull the economy out of crisis. Belarus was the first State in history to voluntarily renounce the possession of nuclear weapons. Now was the appropriate time to delete "the outdated concept of the 'enemy State'" from the UN Charter.

BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

President Alija lzetbegovic said his country's "irrevocable objective" was a "democratic Bosnia and Herzegovina within internationally recognized borders", where the Serbs would have "all rights, up to the highest level of autonomy, but they cannot have a state within a state". The current war, forced upon his country, was "one of the bloodiest" in the history of mankind. From the very beginning, it had not been a war, but rather an attack by a well-armed and equipped army, against defenceless citizens. As a result, 70 per cent of the territory had come under occupation, more than 200,000 civilians killed, over 1 million--one fourth of its inhabitants--expelled from their homes; and hundreds of cities and villages destroyed and burned. The world had "not responded in an appropriate manner to such barbarity"--it seemed "confused and hesitant". But when his people, facing a "threat of extermination and a clearly pronounced death sentence", decided to defend themselves, it had encountered a "new absurdity"--the notorious UN resolution on the arms embargo. Justice had "turned into injustice because the aggressor had weapons"--stockpiled over 40 years--while the victim was "unarmed and its hands were kept tied".

BULGARIA

Foreign Minister Stanislav Daskalov said that sanctions against Serbia and Montenegro had caused "significant direct and indirect losses" to Bulgaria. Those adverse effects had come at a time of major economic transformation, seriously distorting trade and having a "significant negative impact" on the economy, primarily on the emerging private sector. Urgent measures were imperative, and a "more active involvement" of international institutions and developed countries in, for example, financing projects for improving the transport infrastructure as part of the alternative road, railroad and communication links in Europe, as well as provision of better market access for Bulgarian goods and services, would be welcome. In that regard, the further liberalization of world trade and the implementation of GATT were of "paramount importance".

CROATIA

President Franjo Tudjman said his country had become a key factor in the establishment of the "new regional order" in Southeastern Europe, and a recognized and important partner of the international community in the resolution of the "intricate crisis" in Bosnia and Herzegovina. However, split into two parts by the occupation of one fourth of its territory, threatened continuously by "outlaw terrorism", burdened by the social pressures of displaced persons and the "war-exhausted economy", Croatia could not "endlessly agree to fruitless compromise". The source of those crises was Serbian aggression. Since sanctions had forced Belgrade to end the war and isolate the Bosnian Serbs, it should also be made to "desist from supporting the Croatian Serbs", who refused to agree to the reintegration of occupied Croatian areas and "brazenly oppose" the implementation of all Security Council resolutions. Although his country did not want to be "drawn into a new war against its will", it would be "forced to accept it", if the world community failed to achieve a peaceful solution.

CZECH REPUBLIC

Foreign Minister Josef Zieleniec said his country, which participated in many UN operations, felt that a radical reform to "over-come the crisis in the financing of peace-keeping" was needed, and the existing arbitrary mechanism should be replaced with a system based on standard, objective and quantifiable criteria. An independent body to study the principle of a country's capacity to pay should also be set up. The growth in peace-keeping operations had increased the dangers faced by their personnel; therefore, it was "important to complete as soon as possible the work on a convention dealing with responsibility for attacks on United Nations and associated personnel". Improved cooperation between the UN and regional organizations was also needed. "Understanding full well that they all have different charters, characters and qualities, we still feel that a continuing exchange of experience can enrich the entire international system of multilateral diplomacy."

ESTONIA

Foreign Minister Juri Luik spoke on 28 September--a "day of national mourning" in his country. The night before, the passenger and car ferry Estonia, sailing from Tallinn to Stockholm, had sunk at high sea, with most of the more than 850 people on board "presumed to be dead". That tragedy had demonstrated beyond doubt that the Baltic Sea was a "sea of cooperation"--with Swedish, Finnish, Danish and Estonian rescue units working together, and Russia, NATO and countless others offering help. For the first time in half a century, his country was "unfettered by the problem of the presence of foreign troops". The UN role in helping to "remove the last vestiges" of the Second World War had not been small. The celebrations and commemorations of the 31 August troop withdrawal symbolized the "end of one era and the beginning of another". But the problem of Baltic security had not yet been solved, and one dimension of moving towards "bona fide security" lay in trying to improve relations with the Russian Federation. It was the duty of both sides of the 1920 Tartu Peace Treaty to "seize the moment and make that peace again".

GEORGIA

Foreign Minister Alexander Chikvaidze said today's political leaders seemed to have underestimated both the essence and the importance of recent changes in the international system; hence the inability to cope with problems or challenges of the post- confrontational world. Newly emerging independent States, including Georgia, were taking their "first unsure steps" on the road to a democratic society, a long and difficult road in a world that was still reeling from the nature of the changes and that realized neither the extent of the predicament they faced nor the stake it had in their...