NATIONAL STATEMENT GENERAL DEBATE United Nations General Assembly High-level Week More than eight decades ago, the founders of the United Nations understood that no peace built on force could endure. They chose law, cooperation and dialogue as the pillars of a new international order.
Today that conviction is facing one of its greatest tests since the Organization’s founding.
The world is going through a period of profound fragmentation and polarization. Armed conflicts are protracted, transnational organized crime is expanding its capacity for action, the climate crisis is intensifying its effects, development gaps persist, and technological transformation poses unprecedented challenges for our institutions.
At the same time, confidence in multilateralism is weakening precisely when we need it most.
Faced with this reality, Costa Rica reaffirms its conviction that no State can confront common challenges on its own.
Multilateralism is a necessity for preserving peace, promoting sustainable development and protecting human dignity. But it will retain its legitimacy only if it demonstrates the capacity to produce concrete and tangible results for people.
Costa Rica advocates a United Nations that is more agile, more efficient, more transparent and accountable to its Member States. An Organization that sets priorities, eliminates duplication, uses its resources responsibly and measures its results.
International peace and security are facing increasingly complex threats.
Transnational organized crime, drug trafficking, trafficking in persons, illicit arms trafficking, money-laundering, cybercrime and illegal mining transcend national borders and undermine democratic stability, development and the rule of law.
Costa Rica knows these threats first-hand. Illegal mining, driven by transnational criminal organizations in our border area with Nicaragua, has caused serious environmental destruction and creates risks for public health, the economy and regional security.
These organizations contest territories, fuel illicit economies, attack democratic institutions and directly affect the rights and dignity of persons.
Artificial intelligence may well empower cyberterrorism and other crimes that are still unimaginable.
According to Microsoft system usage data, Costa Rica is the country in Latin America with the highest percentage of use of artificial intelligence, at around 58 per cent above the global average.
These threats require greater international cooperation, information-sharing, institutional strengthening and a renewed commitment to international law and international humanitarian law.
Costa Rica has demonstrated that environmental leadership is not measured by the size of a territory, but by the firmness of its commitment to present and future generations.
For decades we have defended a vision in which economic prosperity and the protection of nature are not opposing objectives, but complementary ones.
Climate change particularly affects the most vulnerable, while biodiversity loss, ecosystem degradation, pollution of water resources and pressure on our ocean are accelerating.
These are not isolated challenges. They constitute a global crisis that jeopardizes food security, public health and the development opportunities of millions of people.
There can be no lasting security where democratic institutions are weakened, nor sustainable development when human rights are violated.
Our response must place people at the centre. Costa Rica will continue to defend the dignity and rights of all persons, with special attention to the inclusion, autonomy and effective participation of persons with disabilities, including autistic persons.
In that context, we reiterate our deep concern over the situation in Nicaragua. The deterioration of fundamental freedoms, the persecution of critical voices, the closure of civic space, religious persecution and reports of human rights violations continue to move the country further away from democratic principles.
As a neighbouring nation that has welcomed hundreds of thousands of Nicaraguans, we maintain our firm commitment to the defence of their rights and to the restoration of the rule of law.
We also observe with concern the situation in Cuba and reiterate our call for full respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.
We are also continuing to follow closely the evolution of the situation in Venezuela, with the hope that dialogue, respect for the popular will, the restoration of democratic institutions and attention to persons in vulnerable situations will prevail.
Eighty-one years after the adoption of the Charter, the best way to defend the United Nations is to strengthen its capacity to implement its mandates.
We need a United Nations that is more effective, transparent and agile; capable of preventing conflicts, building consensus even in times of deep polarization and providing concrete responses to the challenges of the twenty-first century.
For that reason, Costa Rica has presented the candidature of Ms. Rebeca Grynspan for the post of Secretary-General of the United Nations.
She is a Latin American with political, economic and multilateral experience; a woman of proven leadership who knows the United Nations and understands that to know an institution also means having the courage to reform it.
Her proposal starts from a simple but powerful idea: To defend the United Nations requires having the courage to reform it.
Today we need leadership capable of uniting the membership, strengthening the Organization and renewing confidence in international cooperation.
We need a United Nations that does what it is called upon to do according to its Charter: maintain international peace and security, respect for Human Rights, and promote development.
Costa Rica firmly believes that the next Secretary-General must be a Latin American woman; it must be Rebeca Grynspan.
Costa Rica abolished its army more than seven decades ago because it believed that International Law could offer greater security than weapons.
We will continue building bridges, forging consensus, and defending the conviction that gave rise to this Organization: dialogue will always be more powerful than confrontation, law more lasting than force, and cooperation the only path toward truly sustainable peace.
The future of the United Nations will not depend solely on the strength of its Charter, but on the collective courage to fulfill it.
In closing, Mr. President and all colleagues, Costa Rica wishes peace, health, and a thousand blessings to each and every one of you.
Thank you very much.