Our Common Agenda 2030: A New Agenda for Peace

In July 2023, Secretary General Antonio Gutteres shared a document entitled: “A New Agenda for Peace.”

During this time of the Hamas/Israeli conflict the UN President of the October Security Council, H.E. Mr. Ronaldo Costa Filho, Brazil Ambassador held several hours of a “Peace through Dialogue” on October 20, 2023.   Ambassadors to many states referred to the “A New Agenda for Peace “by Secretary General Antonio Guterres.  Guterres presented this document as part of the 75th Anniversary of the United Nations.

The multilateral system that has been in place for decades has begun to deteriorate. There is a deep need to strengthen the multilateral system as the only means to safeguard and continue to deliver the promises of the Charter of the United Nations worldwide.

Some of the poignant themes that the Secretary General has outlined are these:

  • A Geopolitical transition
  • The shrinking space for civil participation
  • Rising inequalities within and among nations
  • The climate emergency

The Secretary outlined a few principles for a more effective security system:

  • TRUST
  • Solidarity
  • Universality
  • Dismantling patriarchal power structures
  • Prioritizing comprehensive approaches over securitized responses
  • Ensuring that young people have a say in their future.
  • Financing for peace
  • Strengthen the toolbox for networked multilateralism.
  • An effective and impartial United Nations Secretariat

Here is the outline of recommendations for Member States consideration to create a more multilateral action for peace:

  • Prevention at the global level: addressing strategic risks and geopolitical divisions. This means a commitment to a world free of nuclear weapons.
  • Preventing conflict and violence and sustaining peace
  • Boosting diplomacy 
  • Make use of the UN as the most inclusive arena for diplomacy
  • Strengthening peace operations and addressing peace enforcement
  • Novem approaches to peace and potential domains of conflict
  • Strengthening international governance
  • Reduce the Human cost of weapons.

This document is well worth a good read.  It is comprehensive and significant.

As I listened to eight hours of deliberation by the Security Council on October 20th, I heard many member states refer to the Secretary General’s New Agenda for Peace.

Let us continue to support the UN efforts to bring peace to the Middle East. It is imperative that we strengthen the UN and its purpose as well as call for a ceasefire to bring about new dialogue between Hamas and Israel if there is going to be peace.  May Our Lady Queen of Peace hear us.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres on the situation in the Middle East - Press Conference

On November 6, 2023, the Secretary General gave a moving statement on the situation in Gaza. He quoted a mother in Gaza:

One mother movingly shared with me her desolation over her abducted son Dash on the subject of confronting hatred, she spoke, “When you only get outraged when one side baby is killed then your, moral compass is broken. And your humanity is broken.”

She stood before the world and reminded us, “In the competition of pain there is never a winner.”

We must act now to find a way out of this brutal destruction.

We must help relieve the pain and suffering and pave the way to a two-state solution.