SECOND SESSION OF ECLAC REGIONAL HEARING DISCUSSES UN ROLE IN CONFLICT RESOLUTION AND PEACE PROCESSES IN NEXT CENTURY

Press Release
GA/9584
REC/74

SECOND SESSION OF ECLAC REGIONAL HEARING DISCUSSES UN ROLE IN CONFLICT RESOLUTION AND PEACE PROCESSES IN NEXT CENTURY

SANTIAGO, 1 September (ECLAC) -- The threat of poverty and marginalization to lasting peace, and the need to reconcile national sovereignty and respect for human rights were the main themes this afternoon at the two-day regional hearing organized by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) to discuss the challenges facing the United Nations in the twenty-first century.

The hearing, the fourth in a series of regional meetings held in Western Asia, Africa, Europe, Asia and the Pacific, and North America at the request of Secretary-General Kofi Annan, are in preparation for the Millennium Assembly of the United Nations scheduled for September 2000. Some 150 representatives of civil society and Member States of the ECLAC region are taking part in the hearing held at ECLAC’s headquarters in Santiago.

Speakers at the meeting’s second round table, “The Role of the United Nations in Conflict Resolution and Internal Peace Processes in the Next Century”, discussed changes affecting all regions as a result of the end of the cold war. While the dangers of nuclear conflict have receded, participants emphasized the fact that the Latin American and Caribbean region has suffered and continues to be threatened by unilateral military interventions outside the framework of the United Nations in the name of human rights or the fight against drug trafficking. Participants also recognized the merits of an inescapable globalization process, but stressed the importance of humanizing this process, which is taking place in a unipolar world.

There was agreement that the United Nations is the only international organization structured to face these new demands. Thus, a systemic reform of the United Nations, in particular of its Security Council, is required. Such a reform, however,

- 2 - Press Release GA/9584 REC/74 2 September 1999

depends on the political will of Member States. In this context, participants expressed the hope that respect for international law and the fight against poverty would have the same priority in the coming century as decolonization or the fight against apartheid had in the second half of the twentieth century.

Also discussed were linkages between development and security, and the contradiction between dwindling development assistance on the one hand, and increasing resources earmarked for costly peacekeeping operations on the other. A call was made for the United Nations to take the lead in advocating a resolution of the debt problem facing developing countries.

The second panel of the two-day hearing was moderated by Miguel de la Madrid, former President of Mexico and General Director of the publishing house Fondo de Cultura Económica, and heard panellists Augusto Ramírez Ocampo, of the Commission of National Reconciliation of Colombia; Ana María Romero de Campero, Ombudswoman of Bolivia and former Director of the newspaper Presencia of La Paz; and Carlos Contreras, Executive Secretary of the South American Commission for Peace.

The first panel of the hearing, on the United Nations role regarding protection and promotion of human rights in the coming century, was held Wednesday morning. Speakers included Ronalth Ochaeta, of the Interamerican Institute for Human Rights (IIHR); Luis Demetrio Valentini, Bishop of Jales, Sao Paulo, Brazil; Susana Chiarotti, of the Latin American Committee for the Defense of Women’s Rights (CLADEM); María Emma Mejía, former Foreign Minister of Colombia; José Vargas, Director for Latin America and the Caribbean of Consumers International; and Simeon Sampson, Chairman, Caribbean Rights.

* *** *