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Security Council Open Debate on Inclusive development for the maintenance of international peace and security
Intervention by H.E. Ms Sylvie Lucas, Ambassador, Permanent Representative of Luxembourg to the United Nations:
"Mr President,
I commend Chile's organisation of this open debate on the topic of inclusive development. This issue is of fundamental importance for the maintenance of international peace and security. The Secretary-General, the President of the Peacebuilding Commission and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Leymah Gbowee, have amply demonstrated this in their briefings.
I fully align myself with the statement by the European Union. Allow me to add a few observations in my national capacity.
On the eve of the 2015 World Summit, the interdependence between the United Nations' three pillars of peace and security, sustainable development, and human rights and the rule of law no longer needs to be proven. During our recent Security Council mandate, we have attempted to promote an inclusive approach, in line with our firm belief that peace and security cannot be guaranteed without development, without protection of human rights, or without democratic governance. My country has a long-standing commitment to inclusive sustainable development. We thus continue to give more than 1% of our gross national income for development cooperation, supporting cooperation programmes notably in the social sectors, education and health, in order to support our partner countries ensure the inclusive development of their societies.
Mr President,
The international community is ever more conscious of the need to tackle the root causes of conflict: poverty, discrimination, exclusion, the absence of the rule of law, to name only those. This is obvious in today's Security Council open debate, as well as in the intergovernmental work ongoing at the General Assembly on the establishment of a post-2015 sustainable development programme. We welcome this. For my part, I would like to focus on two aspects of this debate: post-conflict peacebuilding and taking into account the specific needs of women and youth.
Peacebuilding is a long-term effort, which has to mobilise all segments of the societies of the concerned countries and regions and receive coherent and long-term support from the international community. Peacebuilding efforts can only have a lasting impact if they contribute to putting into place inclusive political processes and if they promote the development of competent national institutions, which are accountable to their citizens. The situations in the Central African Republic and South Sudan have, inter alia, also shown that the risk of relapse into conflict is high when this is not the case and when the root causes of conflict are not tackled in an adequate manner.
As other speakers have underlined, it is also paramount to guarantee the participation of women and youth and other groups in society which are too often excluded from decision-making: not only because women and youth are actors of change, but also because they are the most vulnerable in conflict and post-conflict situations. It is important to create perspectives for a better future for these young people, who represent an ever larger part of the populations of developing countries. The marginalisation of young people and and the absence of perspectives for good jobs for youths make them easy targets for those who incite hatred and extremism. Instead of agents of peace and development, they risk becoming agents of instability and violence.
Mr President,
To conclude, I would like to reiterate our support to initiatives aiming to enhance early warning capacities, in particular the Secretary-General's “Rights up Front” initiative, which is to raise the alert when human rights violations or nefarious exclusion dynamics occur. We hope that this initiative will allow the Security Council better to spot conflict precursors and act before it is too late. Maintaining international peace and security and preventing conflict are two sides of the same coin.
History will judge the United Nations on our capacity to work together towards a future with dignity for all. We are convinced that it is possible to achieve this, that we can defeat poverty and violence, as well as adopt models of sustainable development which will allow future generations to live better. This requires us to scale up our efforts, in all fora, including in this Council, to end exclusion and inequality in all its forms.
Thank you."