SECRETARY-GENERAL SAYS ENDURING PEACE AND DEVELOPMENT GO TOGETHER IN MIDDLE EAST, ONE NOT POSSIBLE WITHOUT THE OTHER

13 November 1996

Press Release
SG/SM/6108
EC/2721

SECRETARY-GENERAL SAYS ENDURING PEACE AND DEVELOPMENT GO TOGETHER IN MIDDLE EAST, ONE NOT POSSIBLE WITHOUT THE OTHER

19961113 Message to Cairo Conference Also Stresses Need for People of Region To See Practical Results of Construction and Growth in Their Daily Lives

This is the text of a message from Secretary-General Boutros Boutros- Ghali (delivered on his behalf in Cairo on 12 November by Hazem El-Beblawi, Executive Director of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)) to the Third Economic Conference for the Middle East and North Africa:

This Third Economic Conference for the Middle East and North Africa is taking place in a particularly delicate and important context. Following almost five decades of conflict, the peoples of the region are now convinced of the necessity to lay the foundations for a lasting, just and comprehensive peace, in order to redeploy the region's resources and ingenuity in the service of construction, rather than destruction. Thus, the region is finally resuming its mission of building up civilization.

Since the 1991 Madrid Peace Conference, the peoples and governments of the region have shown their determination to opt for peace, a peace that is based on mutual confidence among the peoples of the region. As emphasized in the United Nations Agenda for Peace, "Mutual confidence and good faith are both essential to reduce the possibility of conflict among countries." Convening such a conference will no doubt strengthen and reinforce confidence among the peoples of the region. At the same time, the countries of the region are urged to make every effort and to seize every opportunity to protect and nurture whatever confidence and credibility have been built up. They must ensure that confidence and tranquillity are not exposed to any unfavourable tempests that may obliterate them. With confidence and optimism, the very foundations of progress are built up. With mistrust and suspicion, however, it is difficult to move even one step ahead.

Our conference is taking place under the motto "Building for the Future: Creating as Investor-Friendly Environment". Perhaps no other motto could have been more suitable for the region at this particular stage. This region carries a history that has bequeathed humanity an extremely rich legacy, and

it is time to complement this legacy with a transcending look to the future and its challenges, a look that matches the depth and memories of the region's history. Inasmuch as history provides the peoples of the region with roots and authenticity, preparations for the future open up to these peoples the best of possibilities and opportunities. However, while history is based on memory, the future is shaped by imagination, and both memory and imagination are characteristics of humankind. No topic is better than investment to link the present to the future.

Investment is not a mere repetition of past experience as much as it is an act of imagination and creativity. Those who prepared for this Conference did well to stress the importance of creating an investor-friendly environment at the national, regional and international levels. At the forefront of such an environment -- and to development, in general -- is the achievement of a stable peace and security. If "development is a basic human right" (as emphasized by the United Nations Agenda for Development), it is also "the safety valve for peace". On the other hand, development, especially investment, cannot flourish under the sound of the drums of war nor in the absence of peace.

Providing a stable peace and ensuring security for all are prerequisites to the efforts of development and to the revitalization of investment. Thus, the keenness of the United Nations on stressing the interrelation and complementarity of these matters. It is these concepts that are emphasized in the Reports of the Secretary-General: The Agenda for Peace (1992) and the Agenda for Development (1995).

By concentrating on investors rather than on investments alone, the organizers of the Conference have demonstrated their farsightedness. Investment is not an abstract idea that materializes in a vacuum; it is, rather, the outcome of decisions made by many investors in the light of their specific conditions and circumstances. Among the most important concerns of our times are the encouragement of private investors and the provision of a favourable environment for those investors.

In an era in which barriers have started to collapse and borders to shrink, the creation of an investor-friendly environment is no longer a national issue, but rather one that requires regional and international efforts. Appropriate regional arrangements are, therefore, important. The Middle East and North Africa embrace quite a few regional organizations and arrangements, all of which deserve care and support. Such organizations include the League of Arab States and the Organization of the Islamic Conference, both of which are based on important cultural considerations that cannot be neglected. In addition there is the Organization of African Unity (OAU). At the same time, United Nations regional organizations, such as the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) and the Economic

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Commission for Africa (ECA), are playing an important and effective role that should be supported so that these commissions can reinforce their capabilities to serve the people of this region.

In his invitation to the participants in this Conference, Amr Mousse, the Egyptian Minister of Foreign Affairs, stated that the purpose of the Conference was to prepare the ground to accelerate the development path in the region and to attract foreign investment. I might add here what I had already declared at the Amman Economic Summit, that in order for economic cooperation to be successful and effective, it should be based on a just and comprehensive peace. Similarly, peace alone, without development or freedom, will remain threatened and subject to instability. In addition, economic development cannot succeed unless it takes place in the broader context of social and human development. The peoples of the region must see, on the ground, the results of construction and growth. They must sense, promptly, the results of peace in their d daily life. They must feel an improvement in their economic and social conditions and the recognition of their political rights in an environment of freedom and democracy.

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