Mauritania

In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, and prayers and peace be upon His Noble Prophet,

Mr. President; Excellencies, Majesties, Highnesses; Mr. António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations Organization; Excellencies; Ladies and Gentlemen;

At the outset, I am pleased to congratulate His Excellency Ambassador Dennis Francis on assuming the presidency of this seventy-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly, wishing him every success, and thanking his predecessor, His Excellency Csaba Kőrösi, for his excellent stewardship of the previous session.

I would also like to pay tribute here to the valuable efforts made by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. António Guterres, in strengthening the role of the United Nations and achieving its objectives.

Ladies and Gentlemen;

Today, our world is beset by acute and diverse crises, compounded by their interconnection, feeding off one another, and encompassing the entirety of their negative effects on everyone—albeit in varying proportions—deepening the interdependence of our common destiny, and heightening our urgent need to accelerate the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals collectively, in keeping with our commitment under the 2030 Agenda.

There is no doubt that progress in implementing these goals remains, in terms of pace, inclusiveness, and scope, far short of what we all hope for, and requires addressing the depth and diversity of current challenges.

In general, it can be said that this progress, particularly in developing countries, remains hesitant, oscillating between slowness, stumbling, and stagnation.

This is evidenced by what we all observe: rising poverty, unemployment, severe health and food crises, alarming inflation, economic recession, the spread of violence, terrorism, destructive armed conflicts, and the accelerating deterioration of our planet's environmental situation.

Yet, despite the bleakness of this picture, hope for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals remains alive, contingent upon our collective ability to chart new paths for multilateral cooperation, correct the imbalances within the development assistance system, and devise more effective mechanisms for providing the necessary resources to finance sustainable development.

Therefore, the current session of the United Nations General Assembly is of great importance, given what it offers, at the midpoint review, for implementing the Sustainable Development Goals, and discussing the best ways to accelerate their pace.

Ladies and Gentlemen;

In the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, we have made the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals a central focus of our developmental efforts, as is clear in our strategy for accelerated growth and shared prosperity, which forms the reference framework for our public development work.

Thanks to our great efforts, we have managed to improve many indicators of the Sustainable Development Goals in our country, despite an unfavorable regional and international climate.

We have fought poverty, fragility, and exclusion by building a broad and comprehensive social safety net, strengthening the resilience of our most vulnerable citizens, supporting their purchasing power through diverse means, and expanding health insurance coverage in a manner that will gradually lead to comprehensive health insurance.

We have also carried out structural reforms that help build a more diverse economy, more resilient, and more capable of creating job opportunities and generating added value, and we have strengthened governance in the economic, financial, and monetary spheres, while taking care to advance our productive sectors—agriculture, fishing, and livestock development—in an effort to strengthen our food security and achieve self-sufficiency.

This reform effort has enabled us to achieve economic growth of around 6.4% last year, and has also improved access rates to basic services: the rate of access to clean drinking water reached 72.33%, and to electricity 91.84% in urban areas and 53% nationwide, with an increase in the share of renewable energy in total energy consumption, reaching 34% in 2020, with plans to reach 50% by 2030.

In this field, we have also opened new horizons through a broad program for developing green hydrogen, which is now in the process of being launched, and which will provide a clean and sustainable alternative energy source. It will help us achieve the goal we have set in our revised national climate contribution, which is a reduction of carbon emissions by 11%.

We place great hopes on the COP28 Climate Summit to be held in the United Arab Emirates, hoping that industrialized countries will honor their commitments to reduce heat emissions and fulfill their pledges from the Paris Summit.

Complementing our efforts in energy transition is our work to combat desertification, climate change, and to restore the balance of our environmental systems, within the framework of the Great Green Wall Initiative and the Joint Committee to Combat the Effects of Drought in the Sahel, and work to promote the green economy.

We have also given great attention to investing in human capital: we have designed and implemented numerous programs to train and qualify youth, enable their access to the labor market, and protect them from extremism and radicalization, in addition to other programs, especially for women's empowerment and their strong involvement in political life and the management of public affairs.

Work is currently underway to implement promising reforms to our educational system, aimed at building a republican school that allows all our children to benefit from a quality education under similar good conditions.

In addition to our efforts to establish the foundations of the rule of law, good governance, and to strengthen social cohesion and consolidate individual and collective freedoms.

We have taken care to advance human rights, protect the rights of women and children, and combat slavery in its modern and residual forms, achieving very positive results, as acknowledged by our partners as well as relevant international bodies.

We have adopted dialogue and openness to all as a steadfast approach in managing public affairs, and we have launched a profound reform of the judicial system, establishing the independence of authorities and consolidating their separation.

We have also developed mechanisms capable of combating corruption in its various aspects.

All these reforms have strengthened the rule of law in our country, and are among the vital elements of our democratic system and its transparency.

We would not have achieved these results had we not succeeded in providing security and stability across our entire national territory, despite the highly turbulent regional and international environment.

We have adopted an integrated and comprehensive security strategy, which has earned praise from everyone, and we have contributed to work on restoring security and stability in the sub-region, through the G5 Sahel group, whose rotating presidency we assume today. We also participate in United Nations peacekeeping forces in the Central African Republic, and we host more than 100,000 of our Malian brothers as refugees due to security unrest.

Our efforts to achieve peace, security, and stability have continued to develop, both regionally and internationally, through a foreign policy based on good neighborliness, mutual respect, cooperation and bridge-building, prioritizing dialogue and negotiation, commitment to charters and international agreements, and standing by just causes.

In this context, I reaffirm from this podium our confirmation of the right of the Palestinian people to establish an independent state, with East Jerusalem as its capital, in accordance with relevant United Nations resolutions and the Arab Peace Initiative. We likewise adhere to solutions that preserve territorial unity and establish the foundations of stability, security, in Libya, Yemen, and Syria.

We also call for exerting every possible effort to end hostilities permanently and effectively in the Republic of Sudan, and to establish a comprehensive political solution in this brotherly country, affirming our support alongside the Somali government in its pursuit of achieving security and stability.

We reaffirm our firm position on the Western Sahara conflict, and our support for the efforts of the United Nations and all relevant Security Council resolutions aimed at finding a sustainable and mutually acceptable solution.

We strongly condemn the phenomenon of Islamophobia, which distorts Islam and sows discord and hatred between Muslims and the West, in particular.

We also express, with concern, our position regarding the continuation of the war in Ukraine, calling for a negotiated solution that takes into account the concerns of all parties, respects international law, and honors the United Nations Charter.

We express our rejection of all forms of seizure of power through unconstitutional means, calling on the brotherly countries of the Sahel that have witnessed military coups to work urgently toward returning to a sound constitutional order.

Ladies and Gentlemen;

We must acknowledge, frankly, that much remains before us to accomplish in order to achieve the 2030 Agenda, and that this requires financial resources far beyond what we are capable of mobilizing on our own, as is the case for developing countries in general, and African countries in particular.

If the burden of debt on these countries were lightened, and they received more investments, or at least what partners have publicly pledged to provide as support, the results today would be better than they are.

Therefore, we call for finding a solution to the debt problem, reviewing the development assistance system, and stimulating support in favor of the least developed and most fragile countries, and promoting multilateral cooperation.

Ladies and Gentlemen;

Our organization, the United Nations, is a founding embodiment of our awareness of the unity of destiny and the necessity of cooperation and solidarity in facing our shared challenges, in accordance with universal human values.

On this basis, we must work together, and continue to reform it, to envision its approach to international crises, day after day, in a more balanced and equitable manner, taking into account the least developed countries, so that everyone's trust in it continues to grow, and the effectiveness of its work improves, in the interest of promoting peace, the security of nations, and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

Thank you, and peace, God's mercy, and blessings be upon you.