MR NZO AT MEETING OF THE COORDINATING BUREAU

Issued by:Department of Foreign Affairs

SUMMARY OF SPEECH MADE BY THE MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS, MR ALFRED NZO, AT THE MINISTERIAL MEETING OF THE COORDINATING BUREAU OF THE NON-ALIGNED COUNTRIES CARTAGENA, COLOMBIA

19 MAY 1998

The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Alfred Nzo, today was the second speaker at the Ministerial Meeting of the Coordinating Bureau of the Non-Aligned countries in Cartagena, Colombia. This is also a preparatory meeting for the Non-Aligned Movement Summit of the Heads of State or Government to be held in Durban from 31 August to 3 September this year where South Africa will assume the Chair. The holding of the Summit in South Africa has a special significance given the role that the NAM and its individual members played in bringing about the demise of apartheid.

Minister Nzo Reiterated that the NAM would continue to play an active role and contribute to resolving other seemingly intractable problems facing the peoples of the developing world. It will be the Movement's duty to work towards:

• addressing humanitarian crises such as famine and refugee disasters confronting the poverty stricken and the helpless;
• improving the inadequacies in the provision of health care;
• defeating the blight of racism, racial and gender discrimination and xenophobia;
• combating continuing human rights violations;
• promoting active programs to address social development and poverty eradication;
• increasing economic development through sound, sustainable and viable macro-economic policies;
• resolving conflicts through peaceful negotiations; and
• the promotion of international peace and security.

In this way the NAM can on the basis of its founding principles take up the challenge facing the international community by advancing equitable solutions to global problems. These challenges are of special significance as the Movement prepares to enter the new millennium.

Other issues that Minister Nzo addresses were:

• that the Security Council be reformed into an organ which is truly democratic and sufficiently representative of the interests of the developing world and to ensure that it assumes the universal character which the NAM envisioned for that body;
• that the proposed establishment of an International Criminal Court which is currently under consideration at the United Nations be given priority;
• the call for reform of international institutions - be it the United Nations, Bretton Woods, or any other;
• the value of South-South cooperation;
• the plight of underdevelopment which is the root cause of conflict;
• the need for a global system of social security that is created and operated through the vehicle of multilateralism;
• more frequent consultation between the G8 and the NAM Troika to advance dialogue and international co-ordination and cooperation;
• that nuclear disarmament remains the priority for the NAM in the field of international security; and
• that more attention needs to be paid in the various international disarmament fora to conventional weapons which have been and are still responsible for most of the killing and carnage which is being wrought on the innocent peoples of the world.

Minister Nzo expressed his wish that South Africa will work actively with its partners in the NAM to pursue realistic and achievable objectives in the achievement of our common goals in the fields of sustainable development and international security.

ISSUED BY THE MEDIA LIAISON DIRECTORATE OF THE DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS. 19 MAY 1998