PRESIDENT OF INDONESIA TO PRESENT UNITED NATIONS WITH PLEDGE ON STABILIZATION OF POPULATION

Press Release
POP/598

PRESIDENT OF INDONESIA TO PRESENT UNITED NATIONS WITH PLEDGE ON STABILIZATION OF POPULATION

Statement from 75 Leaders, Coinciding with Fiftieth Anniversary of World Body, Promises Effort to Balance Rate of Growth with Resources

NEW YORK, 18 October (UNFPA) -- President Soeharto of Indonesia is to present a statement on population stabilization, a pledge to balance population growth and resources, signed by 75 heads of government, to United Nations Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali in a ceremony at the Trusteeship Council Chamber next Wednesday, 25 October. Dr. Nafis Sadik, Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) will also take part in the ceremony.

The presentation is to take place in conjunction with the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the United Nations.

Those signing the statement represent 3.9 billion people, or 68 per cent of the world's population. They maintain that achieving population stabilization is "a world-wide necessity", and that the time has come "for each country to adopt the necessary policies and programmes to do so, consistent with its own culture and aspirations".

The heads of government further stress that programmes for population stabilization "should be voluntary and should maintain individual human rights and beliefs".

President Soeharto has asked heads of government of all the 107 non-aligned nations to join him in signing the population stabilization statement.

In 1966 a comparable statement was initiated by John D. Rockefeller III of the United States and presented to the United Nations Secretary-General U Thant on Human Rights Day. At that time, 12 heads of government had signed the statement.

In 1985, a revised statement on population stabilization, signed by 40 heads of government, was presented by the late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi of India on the fortieth anniversary of the United Nations.

The current statement was initiated by the Population Communication organization, in collaboration with the Global Committee of Parliamentarians on Population and Development and with the Population Institute.

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