Osman Saleh Mohammed, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Eritrea, recalled the failure of the League of Nations to guarantee the objectives of peace, economic growth and prosperity for humanity; the opportunities lost even after the United Nations was formed in 1945 until the end of the cold war; and dangerous trends set in motion in the unipolar world order over the last 30 years.  “The perennial challenges stem from modalities of wealth creation and accumulation and notably in relation to wealth and income sharing,” he stressed.  “The cardinal challenge is how to bring about a new global order that promotes justice and fairness to supplant prevailing global governance architecture,” he said, whose defining contours remain domination, plunder, deceit and repression”.

He expressed serious concern over the appalling economic situation in the underdeveloped countries, and more specifically, on the marginalized African continent.  “Africa remains a continent where raw materials are exported to the so-called ‘developed’ economies for nominal prices; in which manufactured/finished products are imported at highly inflated prices; presiding regimes lavishly waste borrowed money but cynically flaunt semblance of progress while burdened by mounting debt,” he emphasized.  He described humanity’s mission as unsuccessful.

He said the timely and pressing task for all peoples is to strengthen their organizational and coordination mechanisms to prevail against the perennial injustices of domination, deceit, coercion, intimidation, plunder and monopolization. He called for the lifting of all unilateral coercive measures and sanctions imposed on countries, such as Eritrea, as well as the unjust 60-year embargo against Cuba and its arbitrary designation on the spurious “State Sponsors of Terrorism” list.