“We are not striving for a new Cold War,” he said on Tuesday in his first speech to the UN General Assembly as US President. The United States did not want the world to be divided into rigid blocks. Biden portrayed his controversial decision to withdraw from Afghanistan as the start of a new era of diplomacy rather than military intervention.
The great powers of the world have a responsibility to shape their international relations carefully, stressed Biden. “So we don’t tip from responsible competition into conflict.” The US President did not explicitly name China. But Biden made it clear that the US was ready for tough competition, stood up for partners and allies, and opposed all attempts by stronger countries to dominate weaker countries. Biden’s government gives China a prominent position in its foreign policy: The US president regards the world’s second largest economy as the most powerful competitor and the number one geopolitical challenge. Chinese President Xi Jinping was supposed to speak to the UN General Assembly by video later on Tuesday (local time).
At the start of the general debate, UN Secretary General António Guterres called on the international community to do more together in the fight against the corona pandemic and climate change. “I’m here to sound the alarm: the world needs to wake up,” said Guterres. “We stand on the edge of the abyss and we are moving in the wrong direction. Our world has never been in greater danger and never more divided. We are facing the greatest cascade of crisis of our lifetime.”
Guterres, for example, described the uneven distribution of vaccine against the coronavirus as “profanity”. “A majority of the richer world is vaccinated. But more than 90 percent of Africans are still waiting for their first dose. That is a moral indictment of the state of our world,” Guterres said. “We passed the science test. But we failed ethics.”
The world is not standing together enough in the face of crises such as the pandemic and climate change, the UN chief complained. “Instead of humility in the face of these epic challenges, we see presumption. Instead of the path of solidarity, we are in an impasse of destruction.” Nevertheless, he still had hope, Guterres continued. “The problems we have created are problems we can solve. Humanity has shown that we can achieve great things when we work together.”
After the general debate last year, due to the corona pandemic, mainly ended with pre-recorded video speeches, many heads of state and government traveled to New York again this year, albeit with significantly smaller delegations. Austria is represented by Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen as well as Federal Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg (both ÖVP).
