Comoros

Excellency, Madam President of the General Assembly,

Majesties, Highnesses,

Excellencies, Heads of Delegation,

Honorable guests,

Ladies and gentlemen,

Peace be upon you, and God's mercy and blessings.

Allow me first, on behalf of the Comorian delegation, to extend our sincere thanks to the American authorities for the warm welcome and the excellent arrangements made for this 80th Session of our Assembly.

I would then like to congratulate Her Excellency Ms. Annalena Baerbock on her election to the presidency of this Session, and to pay tribute to His Excellency Mr. Philémon Yang for the wisdom and rigor with which he conducted the previous proceedings.

Finally, I salute the leadership of His Excellency Mr. António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, whose commitment to peace and development faithfully embodies the ideals of our Charter, at a time when the international order is going through profound turbulence.

Madam President,

The theme of this 80th Session, "Better Together: more than 80 years in service of peace, development and human rights," takes on its full relevance and urgency in the current global context.

Ten years ago, right here, we set the ambition of a better world by 2030. The Sustainable Development Goals were meant to eradicate poverty, protect the planet, and offer prosperity and peace to all.

Yet, with five years left before that deadline, we must acknowledge that the world is neither more just, nor more peaceful, nor more equitable.

On the contrary, inequalities are deepening, conflicts are multiplying, and humanity is drifting away from the vision that inspired us.

The Palestinian tragedy is the most damning testimony to this.

For more than 70 years, and today more than ever, the Palestinian people have endured the dispossession of their ancestral land, exile, torture, and humiliation.

Their recent history is nothing but a succession of pages written in blood, indifference, and contempt.

Faced with this tragedy, rightly described as genocide by many experts, the international community too often limits itself to verbal condemnations, without concrete action.

We rightly condemned the terrorist acts of 7 October, but the disproportionate response that has been unfolding in Gaza ever since amounts to genocide, whose victims are 80% children, the elderly, and the sick, killed by bombardments that spare neither hospitals, nor aid distribution centers, nor UN personnel, nor journalists.

The crimes perpetrated against Palestine reveal an unbearable contradiction:

Indeed, how can a government, born of a people who were victims of the Holocaust, commit genocide, in full view of the entire world, and today impose on others similar traumas of war, exile, and oppression?

How, moreover, can Israel attack everyone and be in deadly conflict with all its neighbors?

As an old saying reminds us, one does not choose one's neighbor.

We cannot fail to note, and to salute, the courage and humanism of Israelis who raise their voices against this barbarity.

And as history reminds us, in the face of the tragedy of the Holocaust, Arab, African, and Muslim countries were never on the side of the perpetrators of genocide.

On the contrary, our ancestors stood with the Allies to defend the Jewish people, at the risk of their own lives.

Madam President,

The Union of the Comoros, faithful to its principles and to respect for international law, reaffirms its unwavering support for the two-state solution, with East Jerusalem as the capital of the State of Palestine, the only solution for peace and security, for Israel and for the entire Near and Middle East region, because a state has duties and obligations, unlike a group.

We salute France's historic decision, and we pay tribute to President Macron and to the leaders of the many other countries who, on Monday 23 September, recognized the "State of Palestine" from this very UN podium.

We welcome this fortunate initiative, which comes in the wake of the New York Declaration adopted this same month of September by this august General Assembly, and in line with the international conference organized last August by France and Saudi Arabia, under the auspices of the United Nations.

We call on this Assembly to irreversibly place the future of the Palestinian state at the heart of our common agenda.

It is our moral responsibility to act, for every day that passes without action brings the death of thousands of innocents, women and children.

No one will be able to say any longer, "I did not know." History is an implacable judge who will forgive neither silence nor inaction.

Madam President,

Peace and development cannot be built without justice and without inclusion.

That is why, 65 years after independence, Africa, a continent of nearly two billion people, must obtain its rightful place on the United Nations Security Council.

The vision of the African Union — a united, prosperous, peaceful Africa, master of its own destiny — fully aligns with the spirit of this Session.

During my presidency of the African Union, I made conflict resolution and mediation a priority, in order to realize the ambition of "silencing the guns."

This commitment is key to the effective implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area, a pillar of a strong Africa in the concert of nations.

Madam President,

In the same vein, I wish to recall the 1971 resolution declaring the Indian Ocean a "zone of peace, free of nuclear weapons and military bases."

Yet, even today, contrary ambitions threaten this stability.

I therefore firmly denounce any project to establish a military naval base in Mayotte, a Comorian island which, unfortunately, remains under French administration.

The Union of the Comoros, which has just celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of its independence and its admission to the United Nations, remains committed to the full recovery of its national territory — Anjouan, Grande Comore, Mohéli, and Mayotte.

I wish to renew the gratitude of the people and Government of the Comoros to all those who, on the occasion of this fiftieth anniversary, sent us their congratulations and good wishes.

In this context, and from this podium, I cannot remain silent on the question of Mayotte, a Comorian island still under French occupation, despite the clear and repeated resolutions of this Organization.

The dialogue engaged with France on what the late President Mitterrand called an "unpleasant dispute" must reach a conclusion, because this dispute, which has gone on for far too long, costs the lives of thousands of our compatriots every year in the strait separating Mayotte from the other sister islands.

Just this week, extremely serious facts were revealed by an investigation by the French newspaper Le Monde, which reports deliberate maneuvers by police operating in Mayotte that regularly lead to the sinking of boats and cause the death of numerous Comorian nationals.

The Union of the Comoros therefore calls on the French state, the occupying power, to halt these operations, to conduct appropriate investigations, and to punish those responsible for this barbarity, so that justice may be done and the dignity of human life respected.

For its part, the Union of the Comoros will continue tirelessly its diplomatic and legal action so that justice is rendered and a fair solution is found to the question of the Comorian island of Mayotte, which constitutes one of the last wounds of decolonization in Africa.

We regret that certain brotherly countries, which have always defended international law and the Comorian cause, are today hesitating and taking unfortunate initiatives with France to establish relations with Mayotte, in disregard of our national sovereignty.

We call on the African Union to act, to recall the duty and necessity of respecting international law and the unity of our archipelago.

Madam President,

Like many Small Island Developing States (SIDS), the Comoros is on the front line of climate change, and remains a vulnerable but determined country.

Rising waters, coastal erosion, and the increasing frequency of cyclones threaten our villages, our ecosystems, and our lives.

We call for equitable and simplified access to climate financing, and for greater solidarity, so that our populations can not only survive but thrive.

In recent years, the Union of the Comoros has launched the Emerging Comoros Plan (PCE), which aims to transform our economy, strengthen our infrastructure, modernize our education, and improve the health of our populations.

We invite our bilateral and multilateral partners, as well as the private sector, to join this development project full of promise, founded on three pillars: inclusive growth, energy and digital transition, and the blue economy, one of the riches of the Indian Ocean.

Security in this region depends on the stability of each of its states, and we therefore condemn all forms of terrorism and transnational crime.

We advocate for strong, fair, and united multilateralism, founded on the United Nations Charter and respect for the sovereign equality of states.

We must reaffirm our commitment to a fairer world order, where small states have a voice and participate fully in global governance.

To curb the excesses of protectionism and withdrawal into oneself, we favor reforms of the international financial architecture.

After the COVID-19 pandemic, the climate crisis, and the growing indebtedness of developing countries, it is imperative to adapt the global financial system to economic, geopolitical, and social realities.

Fifty years after the proclamation of its independence, the Comorian nation is still young, but strengthened by its experience and its dreams.

The Comorian people, proud of their history and confident in their future, remain committed to this Assembly, which embodies our shared aspirations for peace, justice, and development, which must be continuously consolidated.

I therefore solemnly call on the international community and our development partners to support our efforts, as a pledge for a world truly at the service of peace, development, and human rights.

Thank you for your kind attention.