Celebrating the United Nations Day

As in other parts of the world, the UN Day will be celebrated today in Rwanda. The UN Day marks the anniversary of the founding of the United Nations since the UN Charter was signed on 24 October 1945 in San Francisco, USA. Over the years, the UN day has also provided the opportunity to recognise the immense contributions the United Nations has made to world peace, security and development. The UN’s integrated approach to peace-building, to security and sustainable development has made it a veritable partner for nations and people throughout the world striving for better living conditions, stable environments and protection from all forms of disasters. The UN provides valuable support to countries to put in place policies and programmes for guaranteeing shared growth and prosperity, protection of basic human rights, including gender equality, evacuation and health promotion of sound environmental management as well as stable political and social conditions through reinforcement of participatory processes and mechanisms for human security. A practical expression of all this over the past twelve years has been the Millennium Development Goals. In many parts of the world, numerous UN workers risk their lives to protect innocent people from the horrors of war and natural disasters and in many of them make the ultimate sacrifice. Currently, millions of people depend on UN humanitarian personnel for life-saving assistance. By the end of 2012, over 45.2 million people (including 28.8 million internally displaced persons) were forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, generalised violence and human rights violations. The fighting in Syria is one of the biggest security challenges facing the global community today. In the Great Lakes Region, the war in Eastern DRC has resulted in hundreds of thousands of internally displaced individuals and refugee outflows into the neighbouring countries in the region, notably Rwanda. Similar situations obtain in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa regions. Looking forward, the UN has made the elimination of poverty, particularly in its extreme forms, and sustainability high development priorities. There has been important progress on many fronts. The Millennium Development Goals have cut poverty in half in many parts of the world, including in Africa. But to paraphrase President Paul Kagame’s words, the UN also recognises “the MDGs as a floor and not the ceiling”. MDGs have provided the foundation for accelerated development and transformation. It is for this reason that the UN, under the leadership of Secretary-General Ban Ki–moon, is facilitating the shaping of an even more inspiring and ambitious post-2015 development agenda to maintain the momentum and is actively working towards reaching a global deal on climate change. In Rwanda, the UN contributed significantly to the positive development results the country has realised over the last two decades. The UN’s contribution to Rwanda’s immediate post-genocide recovery, reconstruction and high levels of economic and social development as well as political stability has been substantial. All of this has facilitated the remarkable progress the country has made towards achieving virtually all the MDGs ahead of the 2015 deadline. The UN also provides measurable support to the country in reinforcing its capacity to respond to natural disasters, pandemics and high refugee inflows as well as for environmental protection. In return, Rwanda has provided fertile ground for nurturing measures aimed at enhancing the effectiveness, efficiency and impact of UN’s development and humanitarian work at the country level. There is also broad appreciation for the immense contribution President Kagame has made to UN reforms at the global level. Importantly also, Rwanda’s immense contribution to UN’s Peace Keeping missions around the world is broadly recognised. As one of the initial pilot countries for delivering as one, Rwanda has amply demonstrated over the past five years the rationale for reforming the UN system’s operations at the country level and the very positive results that could be realised there from in terms of improved use of UN’s varied resources and assets. For the coming five years, the UN aims at building on the positive results of the pilot phase of delivering as one and has developed a new programme of support, the United Nations Development Assistance Programme, which responds directly to the key priorities articulated in the newly developed Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy (EDPRS)II 2013-2018 and is highly results - oriented. The UN Country Team in Rwanda has demonstrated what a better coordinated UN system can achieve at the country level. And together, under strong but supportive Government leadership, we are striving to consolidate these efforts and build upon the gains realised so far. In the words of the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, “let us pledge to live up to the United Nations founding ideals by working together for peace, development and human rights”. The writer is the UN Resident Coordinator