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The transformation we seek for a better world will only happen when we trust each other and we accept our responsibility for each other. We in the Caribbean understand something about the necessity of living together. We had no choice. Barbadian novelist and essayist George Lamming once described the Caribbean as perhaps the first global experiment in human history, bringing together, and I quote, every branch of the human family, from the indigenous peoples of the Americas to the diverse peoples from Africa, Europe and Asia. It is as though that we, through this tortuous and shared history of migration, conquest, slavery and the difficult work of constructing a common national and regional destiny that we give the world an example to follow. Against all the odds, the Caribbean produced what Lamming called a new kind of global family. Our history has taught us that difference need not mean division. That coexistence requires dialogue and negotiation, and that those without the power to compel must learn the power of persuasion. These are not merely Caribbean lessons. The universal. And it is.
Hope has retreated, while cynicism and doubt have grown. Nevertheless, we hear the insistent calls for justice, peace, and for a rules based international order that applies equally to all nations. Mr. President, I come here for the first time representing my country, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, with a clear mandate and a commitment that governance must be transparent, that individual actions must consistently reflect integrity, and that public resources must be used to improve the lives of ordinary people. We are a small democratic multi-island Caribbean nation committed to multilateralism and the peaceful resolution of disputes. Those principles serve us well and we believe should bind all of us in this chamber. We, in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines experience firsthand the vulnerability of living on the front lines of climate change, having experienced only two years ago the sudden destructive power of a category five hurricane. We also feel enormous strains imposed on small nations and our small, open economy by distant wars that have disrupted supply chains and by decisions made in places where our voice is never heard. Yet we will not let vulnerability define us or limit our ambitions. We will be resilient, and we will work individually and collectively to transcend our vulnerability. So, Mr. President, we come to this august assembly not as mere petitioners, but as partners to play our part in making our world a better place. I come at this point in the debate, having had the privilege of listening to other leaders who spoke before me. And Mr. President, I must tell you, I was moved by the hopeful vision, the fiery passion, the boundless generosity and caring of many of the speakers. They lifted my spirit and I am determined that that is where my spirit shall remain.
these crises are not abstract. They are lived realities. Climate change threatens our homes, livelihoods and very existence. Debt limits our ability to invest in people. Digital technologies are transforming our societies. Without safeguards, they can reproduce old patterns of domination in a new form. And in our own Caribbean neighborhood,
Mr. president, Secretary-General, excellencies, distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen. Mr. President, let me congratulate you on the assumption of the high office of president of the 81st session of the General Assembly of the United Nations. Expressing appreciation to your predecessor for her stewardship of the 80th session of the General Assembly, and I wish her every success in her future endeavors. Secretary-General, as you approach the conclusion of your tenure, the Republic of Suriname commends the dedicated service to humanity showcased while in office. We also remember with warmth your visit to Suriname expressing the importance of the United Nations engagement with our country and the Caribbean region. We wish you well in the path before you.
Saint Kitts and Nevis is not seeking pity; we are advancing partnership. A sustainable island state is not a distant ambition; we are building it today. Yet, even as we advance, the climate crisis is moving the goalposts. This year, our federation and the wider Caribbean faced severe drought. By the end of May, rainfall was 44% below the long-term average. We are investing in resilient infrastructure. But no small island developing state can adapt indefinitely to a crisis the world continues to intensify. Adaptation cannot excuse inaction elsewhere. Distinguished colleagues, the science is unequivocal. The years 2015 to 2025 were the warmest on record, and in 2025, global average temperature remained about 1.43 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial baseline, while global mean sea level stood approximately 11 centimeters higher than in 1993. For island nations, this is a question of sovereignty and statehood. If our coastlines retreat, our sovereignty must not.
And then we had talked about artificial intelligence and global security. Today, I want to agree with President Trump that we are now talking about a call for practical, practical AI to be renamed superintelligence. SI, we commit to that. Mr. President, the illicit flow of firearms and narcotics is a major security concern for Trinidad and Tobago and the wider Caribbean.
Mr. President, for countries like ours, a rules-based order is a condition for our security and a guarantee that it is the norms agreed on by everyone and not force that resolve disputes between nations. It's for this reason that it's necessary to restore trust in this organization, and three things are necessary in this regard to achieve it: renewing representation, renewing peacekeeping operations, and renewing support for developing countries. We support the UN80 initiative with a sense of conviction. However, there is no reform that can be successful without resources behind it, and that's why the Dominican Republic is complying and playing our role. This year, we were one of the first countries to fully pay our contribution to the regular budget. Renewing representation requires a security council that looks more like the multipolar world of the present, and it also requires thinking about who will lead this organization next. This year, I affirmed, from this very same rostrum, that it was the turn of Latin America and the Caribbean to provide renewed leadership, and that the time had come for a woman to be Secretary-General of this organization. The candidates that are running confirm this. In more than 80 years, no woman has led this organization. We trust that the Security Council and the General Assembly will rise to this moment.
And we thank the former president, Annalena Baerbock. Mr. president, one year ago, standing at this very podium, the Prime Minister of Grenada addressed this General Assembly not only as a head of government but as a proud son of the Caribbean. He reminded us that our region continues to literally and figuratively weather storms, yet continues to rise with resilience, dignity, and hope. Today, as I stand before you representing the people of Grenada, I speak of transformation because resilience alone is no longer enough.
it did not make. The promise of our generation was made 81 years ago with the founding of this United Nations from the ashes of the worst war in human history. Its ideals have proven its worth. No nation is too small to be sovereign, no people too poor to be equal. And the strong should be bound by the same law as the weak. Sad to say, United Nations has drifted from its promise. The Bahamas comes today to insist on it. Mr. president, all week we've been told this is an age of uncertainty. With respect, I do not agree. Uncertainty is the language of those who have already decided and do not wish to say so. Treaties are being torn up, institutions are being starved, rules are giving way to deals, and the benefits of the deals go to whoever holds the most leverage. Once again, we hear the language of spheres of influence, of backyards and hemispheres. For 500 years, the Caribbean was somebody's backyard. We did not win our freedom to once again become somebody's backyard. The message to small nations is very clear be as sovereign as we allow you to be. Mr. President, a sovereignty that must ask permission is not sovereignty. It is a lease. Our ancestors did not break their chains so that their children could become tenants. These are not uncertain times. These times are very certain. The only uncertain thing is how we respond to the opportunities and challenges of this time. People often say that the world lacks political will. I do not agree. The world has never lacked political will. In 2008, when the banks of the richest nations were failing, trillions of dollars were found in a matter of weeks. When a global pandemic reached the capitals of the powerful, the political will returned. The will exists. It is simply pointed elsewhere. Somewhere, a bank is always too big to fail. Similarly, a nation should never be too small to be left behind. What the world lacks is not political will for change. It is political change itself. A change in who writes the rules. A change in whose suffering counts. A change in who decides and who pays. Political will is a feeling. Political change is a decision about who holds the power. And Mr. President, that is what I have come to speak about today. Power. 2500 years ago, the envoys of Athens stood before the small island of Milos and told his people a simple truth about power. The strong will do what they can. The weak will suffer what they must. 81 years ago in San Francisco, humanity wrote a different law: the sovereign equality of nations, not equality of size or wealth, equality of standing. The United Nations was the world's answer to Milos.
Mr. President, the current erosion of international peace and security carries an uncomfortable echo of the League of Nations final years. The League did not collapse for want of noble principles, but because member states abandoned those principles the moment they became inconvenient or constrained their power. I therefore cannot speak candidly about multilateralism while looking away from where it is tested most severely. I begin close to home. Haiti's crisis is our crisis. Haiti is the Caribbean. While there are grounds for hope in elections now scheduled for December, there is also grave concern over a spike in violence threatening that process. Belize echoes the call of the CARICOM Eminent Persons Group. The Gang Suppression Force must be urgently and fully deployed. A Haitian-led, Haitian-owned political transition deserves a security environment in which it can actually succeed. Belize stands with the people of Haiti and with CARICOM in asking for nothing less. Belize also stands with Cuba.
We will see colonies disappear. The exploitation of peoples by monopolies disappear, and humanity will then have achieved a genuine stage of progress. However, it is alarming to see the advance of expansionism, usurpation, plunder, conquest as well as military and economic aggressions. The U.S. government aspiration to impose peace through force is unrealizable. The fundamental pillars of international law, and the United Nations organization, such as the sovereign equality among states are under permanent attack. The genocidal crime of Zionism against the Palestinian people, the pirate attacks against vessels, and the extrajudicial executions in the Caribbean Sea and some areas in the Pacific, the military aggression against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and the war against the Islamic Republic of Iran are new expressions of this atrocity. They are also a reflection of the crisis of identity and relevance imposed on the United Nations organization, and even on this General Assembly, the most universal, democratic and representative body of the international community. We are convinced of the need to preserve and strengthen the United Nations.
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No. 12
Sierra Leone09/22 · first at about 8 min2 mentions
Through ECOSOC, Sierra Leone will champion a development system that responds more effectively to Africa's priorities. Mr. president, restoring trust and delivering for all must also embrace the unfinished cause of Reparatory justice. In March, this Assembly adopted a resolution led by Ghana and supported by the African Union and Caribbean Community, recognising the trafficking and racialized chattel enslavement of Africans as the gravest crime against humanity. For Sierra Leone, this history is neither abstract nor distant. From Bunce Island, in our own river estuary, thousands of Africans were forcibly transported across the Atlantic into enslavement. Freetown, our capital, would later become a home for formerly enslaved and liberated Africans. This history is woven into our national identity. However, the consequences did not end with abolition. Their legacy continues to be reflected in enduring disparities in wealth, power and opportunity across our world. Reparatory justice is therefore not a plea for charity. It is a call for acknowledgement, formal apology the return of cultural heritage fair redress and guarantee of non-repetition. Sierra Leone stands with Africa the Caribbean and the wider African diaspora in advancing this cause, not to remain captive to the past, but to build a more just and equitable future.
Our survival is inseparable from the ocean. The entry into force of BBNJ agreement is therefore an important achievement for multilateralism. But implementation will be the real test. SIDs must share fairly in the benefits arising from marine genetic resources. Capacity building must be meaningful and marine technology must be accessible. Madam president, climate justice cannot be separated from historic justice. The Caribbean did not arrive at this moment on equal terms.
Mr. president, development also requires peace and security. For Jamaica and our wider Caribbean region, transnational organized crime remains a serious threat. Last year, from this very podium, Prime Minister Andrew Holness called for a global war on gangs, a coordinated international effort capable of matching the reach, financing and sophistication of transnational criminal networks. Jamaica reiterates that call today. Illicit firearms do not manufacture themselves in our communities. They cross borders. Criminal money crosses borders, criminal networks exploit technology and operate across borders. Our response must therefore also cross borders. We call for stronger cooperation in firearms tracing and interdiction, intelligence and information sharing, financial investigations, and law enforcement capacity building. We also urge major arms-exporting states to strengthen export controls and post delivery verification. At home, Jamaica has invested heavily in our security forces, strengthened legislation, enhanced intelligence gathering oversight and transformed policing. The results are remarkable by any standard. In 2025, Jamaica recorded its lowest number of homicides in more than three decades. And in 2026, with even further reductions, the Global Peace Index ranked Jamaica the most peaceful country in the Caribbean. We recognize that there remains work to be done, but the direction is clear and our objective is not merely fewer crimes. It is a durable ecosystem of peace in which every Jamaican can feel safe, raise a family, do business, and fulfill his or her potential, and retire in Paradise. Mr. president, nowhere in our region is the challenge of criminal gangs more devastating than in our CARICOM sister nation of Haiti. Jamaica stands firmly with the Haitian people.
Next December, our country will finish its mandate as a non-permanent member of the Security Council. As we took on this high, lofty task, our premise was clear. We didn't come to the council to choose sides. We came to the council to defend principles: sovereignty, territorial integrity, the peaceful settlement of disputes, and the protection of civilians. They are the rules that protect the very existence of states, particularly the smallest states. I wish to reiterate to this General Assembly the need for Latin America and the Caribbean to have places with greater decision-making power in the Security Council, specifically a permanent seat, a permanent member of the Security Council of this organization. We are a region that plays a protagonist role in food, minerals, biodiversity, and a deep-seated belief in peace and integration. Our conclusion is without doubt. The world doesn't need less UN. It needs a United Nations that works better, that acts with preventive diplomacy, and that can yield positive results in the short term. We are at a turning point in our history. The election of the next Secretary-General will be of paramount importance to determine the next agenda, to ensure robust, lasting trust, of course, in the understanding of the new global balance, if you can call it that.
In Latin America and the Caribbean region, geographical proximity to the world's greatest military power is inescapable, especially in the context of renewed hegemonic temptations. Brazil does not fit in anyone's backyard. We need partners with a positive agenda that fosters development. Ideological differences should not hinder higher integration amongst neighbors.
Mr. president, as we commence this 81st session, we have the opportunity to build a United Nations that is truly fit for purpose. The crisis confronting multilateralism can become the catalyst for its renewal. The United Nations must not be a monument to the past. It must become an instrument for the future. We need a Security Council that reflects the geopolitical realities of the 21st century, not the power structures of 1945. A council that embraces the emerging multipolarity of our world, including permanent representation from Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean. Mr. president, if the United Nations is to remain humanity's best hope, then this is not the hour to retreat from multilateralism. This is the hour to reclaim and to renew it. For it is in times such as these, when wars rage across borders, when the shadow of existential threats falls across the future of human civilisation, when the old certainties are dissolving before our eyes, that multilateralism must rise. Multilateralism rests upon the proposition that our destinies are bound together, that the security of one cannot be at the insecurity of another, and that in an interdependent world, cooperation is a necessity, and where there can be no enduring prosperity, when inequality deepens and no just international order, when rules are applied selectively. It is to that truth that this 81st session of the General Assembly must recommit itself. But recommitment cannot mean merely repeating the language of yesterday. The world has changed and multilateralism must change with it. We need a new and invigorated multilateralism, one equal to the turbulence of our age, sufficiently courageous to confront its trials, sufficiently imaginative to navigate its transformations, and sufficiently principled to defend the rule of international law. To make the United Nations fit for purpose, we must make it more transparent, accountable, and responsive. We must strengthen the General Assembly and give greater weight to its deliberative and representative authority. We must bring greater coherence to a system too often divided by institutional rivalries, bureaucratic silos, and competing mandates. We must ensure that the resources of the UN match the responsibilities we have entrusted to it. But institutions do not reform themselves. They require leadership capable of seeing beyond the present and imagining the institution the future demands. The United Nations needs leadership that can bring its different organs, agencies and programs into greater unity of purpose, leadership that can build bridges where division has become habitual. Leadership that can defend the principles of the charter without fear or favour. The United Nations needs its next Secretary-General to work with all Member States to restore confidence in the organisation, mobilise its energies and turn the language of multilateralism from aspiration into action. The reform of the United Nations, the restoration of trust and the need to manage transformation, is therefore inseparable from the question of leadership, and the choice of its next secretary general will be, in no small measure, a choice about the kind of United Nations we wish to leave to the generations that follow. It is in this spirit that Guyana has put forward the candidature of Her Excellency Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett for the office of Secretary General of the United Nations. She has served her country, represented the developing world and worked within the multilateral system with a deep understanding of both its promise and its imperfections. We believe that her experience, her convictions, her record of service, speak directly to the kind of leadership this moment demands. Her candidature, therefore, acquires special significance amid the profound challenges confronting the United Nations and international order. We need leadership capable of restoring trust without compromising principles, of listening, without surrendering conviction of building bridges across the widening chasms between north and south, between large states and small, between the developed and developing world. We need a secretary general who will defend the charter not only when it is politically convenient, but precisely when its principles are under pressure. On a personal note, Mr. President, Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett. Come from every experience. Her very upbringing crossed every struggle, every aspect of our accomplishment defined and broke barriers. An indigenous woman coming from a small indigenous village defying the odds. The odds against indigenous persons, the odds against women, the odds against poverty. Defining every challenge and rising to the top amidst those challenges. Her character is built on struggle, sacrifice, commitment her accomplishments are crafted in her humanity. This is an individual of extreme qualities not because she is a Guyanese, not because she come from Guyana, but because I know personally and many of you know this too, the permanent representatives sitting here in New York, you know, her character knew who? You know her integrity. You know her will. You know her commitment. You know her love for humanity. You know her love for this world. And I know that this world will be a better place with Carolyn Rodrigues as the secretary general of the United Nations. In the humblest of ways, I call on the P5, the Security Council and every member here to look beyond the small country that nominated her. Look beyond the small country that nominated her. CARICOM as a body has endorsed her. And let us rise to the challenge of giving this indigenous woman the chance of helping us craft together the United Nations we want to see succeed. The responsibility for recommending the next Secretary general rests in the first instance with the Security Council, and we therefore respectfully place before its members the candidature of Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett, endorsed by the Caribbean Community. We invite all to consider her candidacy on its merits and to judge whether her vision, experience, expertise and record can help restore confidence in the United Nations at this critical moment. Mr. president, the United Nations was conceived in hope, and that hope remains alive in the pursuit of peace, security and human progress over the perpetuation of division and war. This is why we must not abandon multilateralism because it is imperfect. We must renew it because humanity still needs it. Let us therefore build a United Nations that does not merely reflect the world as it is, but help create the world as it ought to be. A world where law restrains power, cooperation overcomes division, and every human being can look to the future with hope. Guyana believes that the choice remains ours as to whether the divisions of our age will define the future, or whether nations can summon the will to build a more peaceful, secure and prosperous international order. The United Nations must be at the heart of that endeavour, not as an institution looking back at the world it was created to serve, but as one helping humanity shape the world that is yet to come.
Everyone is aware of it. Its name is Venezuela. Before coming to New York, I visited Caracas, despite the fact that the diplomatic relations between Paraguay and Venezuela have been suspended. My decision to visit the Caribbean country, therefore, surprised many, and many people have questioned, sometimes harshly, my decision. I therefore like to use this forum to say it loudly and clearly: I didn't go to Venezuela to legitimize a regime. I did not go there to legitimize or validate anything whatsoever. No, ladies and gentlemen, quite the opposite. Paraguay cherishes democracy, and we believe that the Venezuelan people also deserve democracy. The reason I went to Venezuela is because, for 25 years, South American leaders have issued fine, lyrical rhetoric, resounding statements, and countless slogans on Venezuela. For 25 years, we watched, we waited, and we condemned, from the comfort of this distance, without doing anything for the Venezuelan people. We watched. We talked. But we didn't act. We did nothing. In the meantime, our Venezuelan brothers and sisters suffered. That is why I went to Venezuela a few days ago, to take a second step following the first difficult but extremely important step that was represented by the fall of the dictator Maduro. Because Paraguay can play a useful role in the second step: Venezuela's transition towards a pluralistic democracy. Venezuela is now facing a new reality. Defending our values cannot mean standing indifferent to that reality. That is why Paraguay has opened a channel of dialogue with the Venezuelan authorities and is already taking action towards a Venezuela in which power resides with its one true sovereign, the Venezuelan people. Dialogue doesn't mean abandoning our principles or forgetting the past. It means having the courage to look ahead and to act. We cannot wait for the United States or some northern power to resolve our problems. We have to resolve them ourselves. Venezuela, what I want, is what my own country achieved after 35 years of dictatorship in 1989: a real, lasting democratic transition. I don't want a photo opportunity. I don't want a communiqué. I want, we want, a transition. With institutions, with security, with an economy, and with a people that are once again integrated into the international community and, in our region, integrated into Mercosur. Paraguayan leadership doesn't confuse dialogue with indifference. Dialogue, talking, is one way of standing with the Venezuelan people. It's also a way of jointly combating transnational crime, which knows no borders and which harms our entire region. Today I call on all my Latin American brothers and sisters, but also on these United Nations. Let us come together to help Venezuela, this beautiful country, to reintegrate into the world and achieve a democratic government that respects human rights. To borrow the words of the Latin poet Publius: I am human. Nothing human is alien to me. The suffering of the Venezuelan people is also the suffering of the Paraguayan people. It is the suffering of us all. And what applies to Venezuela applies, perhaps even more so, to Nicaragua, Cuba, and Haiti, countries that have lived for far too long in the darkness of authoritarianism, violence, and sorrow. Let us bring light to these sister nations. For where there are free elections, there is hope. But we mustn't stop at words. We must act. Let us do so.
Ecuador will continue to fulfill our responsibilities and invite all of you to join us. Latin America and the Caribbean is a region with a lot of talent, energy, food, strategic resources, and above all, youth that is resolved to building a different future. It's a region that has not come to this Assembly to ask for solutions from the outside, but rather to offer up our solutions. And one of the greatest challenges of the future is artificial intelligence.
Addressing these challenges is allowing us to focus on the future. Honduras is a conscientious country, a country of law, a country in which we invite you to invest. Anyone who invests in Honduras will be offered opportunities, order, transparency, and clear rules. We are adhering to the International Monetary Fund guidelines. In the seven months that my country has been in office, we have increased our international reserves to the tune of $1.3 billion, and that is an increase of 13%. We returned to the International Center of Arbitration, CIADI, on the 6th of March 2026. We'd been members of that center since 1989, and we returned to resolve our problems with a sense of solemn responsibility. With these steps, we sought to reiterate that in Honduras, rules apply to everyone, and rules are followed. On that basis, Honduras can offer concrete investment opportunities in logistics, industry, energy, infrastructure, agroindustry, mining, tourism, to name just a few sectors. We are the center of America. We stand between two oceans. We are optimizing Puerto Cortés— that is a port in our Caribbean-Atlantic area— and it is the port with greatest potential for growth in the country, and one of the largest, most important ports in Central America. We are investing to strengthen our road infrastructure so that we can create a logistics corridor to join the Atlantic with the Pacific. This project and its location means that we can offer to the world safe, reliable, and efficient supply chains. Honduras is one of the world's key textile exporters. We manufacture the clothes of well-known brands. We also manufacture cable harnesses and automobile parts that are sold around the world. They've come from Honduran factories. Around 200,000 Honduran people work in those industries. These factories, maquilas, and other forms of industry require stable energy at competitive prices. It is for that reason that the National Congress recently adopted a reform to our electrical energy law. That reform had been championed by the Presidency. In light of the above, we invite both national and foreign investment: investment in the development of Honduras's energy sector, investment in the generation, transmission, and distribution of energy. Our land is fertile land.
Lasting peace requires addressing the root causes of conflict, empowering local communities, and ensuring that women are at the center of peace building. Mr. president, excellencies, our world is evolving. So must the United Nations to remain effective. We must reform the Security Council to make it more representative, transparent and accountable, expanding the voices of developing regions across Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. As we look to the future, we are reminded that everything we strive for ultimately depends on how we choose to navigate these trials together. We need to reflect deeply on the promises of our charter and on the state of our fractured world. We must actively seek collective pathways that transcend borders and bridge divides. And above all, we must always put a face to what we do, remembering that every policy, every treaty, and every institutional reform is ultimately about real human lives. It is in this spirit that we voice a historic aspiration the hope for a woman Secretary-General, a leader who can rally nations back to true multilateralism and deliver for all. Thank you very much.
This same commitment is also being engaged in our own region in Latin America and the Caribbean. Mexico will continue to work to preserve the nature of the zone of peace that our peoples created for ourselves and to strengthen cooperation in fora such as CELAC and the Pacific Alliance. Our regional vocation also explains Mexico's position, the position that we have had for more than six decades, and that solidarity with the people of Cuba rejecting the embargo, and any unilateral measure that is against the UN Charter, we will continue to send humanitarian aid to address the most urgent needs of its population, because the fraternity between our nations does not depend on any given situation, uh, in any moment or differences between us. This solidarity is also calling on us to pool our efforts to deal with regional differences on the basis of dialogue and working with one another above and beyond our hemisphere. We are strengthening our links with Asia and Africa, and recently modernized our partnership with the European Union. Uh, confirming the close links between partners. Um, and, um, this doesn't ever mean that, uh we have different distance between other partners either.
Defending multilateralism does not mean defending the status quo. The United Nations must become more effective, representative, transparent and responsive to people. It must make better use of its resources, reduce duplication and respond more swiftly without weakening the purposes for which it was created. Efficiency must strengthen, not erode, its three pillars peace and security, sustainable development and human rights. Effectiveness cannot be measured solely in administrative terms, but rather by the ability to prevent a war, protect a population under threat, combat hunger, confront transnational criminal networks, or support a state in strengthening its institutions. We do not need a United Nations that is smaller in purpose. We need a United Nations that is stronger in results and firmer in defending democratic principles. That transformation must also reach the Security Council. Its composition must better reflect the realities of the 21st century and remedy the long standing underrepresentation of entire regions. When the veto causes paralysis in the face of serious threats to international peace and security, confidence in the entire system suffers. We also face an important decision for the future of the organisation the selection of the next secretary general. Guatemala hopes that the process will be transparent and inclusive, and will identify an independent leader able to build bridges, defend the principles of the charter and lead the reform our organisation needs. The Latin American and Caribbean region stands ready and prepared to shoulder its responsibility to the international community. The time has come for a Latin American woman to serve as secretary general of the United Nations. Excellencies. Distinguished delegates.
Nowhere on earth is a planet warming faster than in Western Europe. But in the Caribbean part of our Kingdom, including the countries of Aruba, Curacao and Sint Maarten the effects of climate change have already been felt for much longer. And the same is true for many of your countries. For too long, the consequences of climate change have been trivialized or simply denied. But after the horrors experienced by Nepal and a long series of forest fires, the truth should be clear to everyone the climate crisis will not just disappear if we pretend it doesn't exist. We are living on borrowed time, and the generations that come after us will pay the price. And if you want to prevent that, we must commit now to both mitigation and adaptation. And we all know what needs to be done. Countless reports are agreed on that. And we have all the technology we need. Fortunately, we are making progress. Last year, the electrical vehicle market grew by 20%. Wind power capacity grew by 14% and solar power by more than 30%. And this growth in renewable energy has exceeded even the most optimistic projections from ten years ago. And the challenge now is to accelerate this transition in all sectors and all parts of the world. And at the same time, to reduce carbon emissions and phase out fossil fuels. That is why the Netherlands, jointly with Colombia, organized the world's first conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels. This event in Colombia was attended by 57 countries, and together these countries account for one third of global GDP, one third of energy demand and one fifth of supply. And together we worked to find concrete and practical solutions to take the transition forward. But climate action requires everyone to contribute. In November, we will gather at a COP in Turkey. And I know that many of you don't have high expectations. But in my view, this can only be explained by the pessimistic idea that we are somehow powerless. But that is not true. We have the knowledge and we have the technology to combat climate change.
Developing nations and the global South borrow at interest rates that are up to eight times higher than industrialized nations. African and Caribbean nations struck by climate disasters are forced to take on crippling debts to rebuild from floods and droughts that they did not cause. Governments are forced into a tragic choice to service predatory debt or to serve their people. We demand reform. We need long term, affordable and accessible concessionary financing that enables developing economies to invest in human capital, in industrialization and climate adaptation. Mr. President, Africa does not seek charity. Africa seeks equal partnership that is anchored in mutual respect.
As Turkey, we continue to support the success of this process. Now, also through our Asia Anew Initiative, we continue to strengthen our relations with our partners in the Asia Pacific region. We regard the elevation of our relations with ASEAN to the level of dialogue partnership as a concrete outcome of this approach. Likewise, we are developing our relations with the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on the basis of mutual respect, partnership and a win win approach.
