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President Kufuor calls for collective
action to contain global insecurity
From: Kwaku Osei Bonsu, GNA Special Correspondent, New York
New York, Sept. 25, Ghanadot/GNA - President John Agyekum
Kufuor on Tuesday called for collective action to rein in
the growing threat of global insecurity resulting from the
use of small arms and light weapons.
This, together with terrorism, he said constituted the real
weapons of mass destruction.
President Kufuor who made the call when addressing the
formal session of the 62nd United Nation's General Assembly,
challenged the world body to study the threat and design the
means to contain and eliminate it.
He said in the light of the menace, the 192-member
organization should support the UN Secretary General's
proposal to establish an Office for Disarmament Affairs to
be part of the decision-making process in the Secretariat.
Additionally, it was important that they cooperated in the
enforcement of its recommendations.
President Kufuor who is also Chairman of African Union (AU),
used the UN platform to draw attention to the serious gap in
the official development assistance to the Continent.
He noted that despite the general improvement in the
relationship between the developed and developing nations,
as reflected in various interventions like the US Millennium
Challenge Account (MCA) and AGOA, African, Caribbean and
Pacific (ACP) Agreements with the EU and the China-African
Forum, there was still a yawning gap that needed to be
bridged quickly to enable Africa attain the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs).
President Kufuor therefore, demanded that development
partners fulfilled their support, pledges and in addition,
remove trade barriers.
He declared that Africa was now making progress with
improvement in the macro-management of most of their
economies.
Giving statistics, President Kufuor said average Gross
Domestic Product (GDP) growth had increased steadily from
5.2 per cent in 2005 to 5.7 per cent in 2006 to the current
six per cent that was expected to be sustained or even
exceeded in future.
"The Continent is more than ready for good business and this
is evidenced by the increasing interest by both local and
foreign investors," he added.
On trouble spots in Africa - Darfur and Somalia, President
Kufuor welcomed as refreshing, the Security Council's
resolution authorising the deployment of a hybrid operation
in Darfur.
However, he pointed out that the peace initiative in Somalia
was proving extremely challenging and well beyond the
capacity of AU and asked for concerted and timely support
from the UN.
UN Secretary General, Ban-Ki Moon, in his report said it was
time to focus more on results and less on rhetoric.
He pledged that everything would be done to bring peace to
the Sudan's Darfur crisis.
US President George W. Bush and Brazilian President Inacio
Lula da Silva also addressed the Assembly.
GNA
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