United Nations (EFE)
“Prospects for peace continue to shrink. The possibilities of further escalation and further bloodshed continue to grow,” Guterres said in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly.
“I am afraid that the world is not sleepwalking towards a broader war (but) that it is doing it with its eyes wide open,” insisted the Portuguese diplomat, who on Monday presented his priorities for this year to the member states.
Guterres stressed that the “Russian invasion of Ukraine is inflicting untold suffering on Ukrainians, with profound global implications” and insisted on the need to achieve peace “in line with the United Nations Charter and international law.”
In a gloomy speech, the head of the United Nations recalled that the experts who have been updating the famous “Doomsday Clock” for 75 years consider that the planet has never been so close to self-destruction as it is today.
According to Guterres, it is time to put arms control back at the center of the debate, reducing the strategic threats of nuclear weapons and working towards their elimination.
“Nuclear countries must first give up using these inconceivable weapons. In fact, they should give up their use at any time or place. The so-called tactical use of nuclear weapons is absurd,” he insisted.
As he said, the world today suffers the “greatest danger in decades of a nuclear war that could start by accident or by design.”
The UN does not lose sight of other problems
In addition to the dangers of war and geopolitical fractures, Guterres drew attention to other crises such as climate change and inequality, which are placing the world at its most complex moment in a generation.
“This path is a dead end. We have to correct the course », he insisted in his first big speech of the year, in which he charged very harshly against the short-termism of political and business leaders.
“The next election, the next tactical maneuver to cling to power, but also the next business cycle or even the next day’s stock price. The future is someone else’s problem: this short-term way of thinking is not only deeply irresponsible, it is immoral,” she stressed.