Last year’s Paris agreement to to combat climate change will help to reverse a rise in global temperatures, and the U.S. deal with Iran to roll back the country’s nuclear program has reduced the threat of another Mideast war, Mr Obama said.
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Obama’s longstanding differences with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his actions in Ukraine have accompanied intense disagreement over Syria’s future and a series of failed attempts by Russia and the USA to resolve the civil war there together. Countries that often have fewer resources than many of those who are doing little or nothing, ” Obama said.
The Leaders’ summit – co-hosted by the United States, the UN Secretary General, Ethiopia, Canada, Mexico, Germany, Sweden and Jordan – came on the heels of the UN Summit on Refugees and Migrants, and sought concrete pledges in three areas: improved access to education and job opportunities for refugees, resettlement and other forms of admission, and humanitarian finance.
“After 10 years in office, I am more convinced than ever that we have the power to end war, poverty and persecution”, he said. Obama said the global refugee crisis poses a security threat because of its enormous scale.
He said governing had become more hard as people lose faith in public institutions and tensions among nations spiral out of control more rapidly.
Mr Donald Trump, the Republican candidate, has vowed to pull the U.S. out of the accord if he is elected.
These increases are welcomed by refugee advocates, but the numbers represent only a drop in the bucket compared to what many other smaller countries are grappling with. “We have to do better on this occasion”.
“We can not avert our eyes or turn our backs. To slam the door in the face of these families would betray our deepest values”, he added. “It would deny our own heritage as nations, including the United States of America, that have been built by immigrants and refugees”. More than 65.3 million people are now displaced worldwide.
“Collectively, our nations are roughly doubling the number of refugees that we admit to our countries to more than 360,000 this year”, Obama announced at the Leaders’ Summit on Refugees, held at the UN headquarters in NY.
Power said the summit wouldn’t be a “panacea” for the crisis, but would show what the USA can achieve when it leads on an issue of global concern. They have vowed to provide various types of in-kind support to refugees, including Chromebook computers from Google, plus educational, job training and employment opportunities.
In his final address to an annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations on Tuesday, Ban said the Syrian government “continues to barrel bomb neighbourhoods and systematically torture thousands of detainees”.
Ban also paid tribute to Mardini, saying she might not have won a medal at the Olympics but was a victor nonetheless.
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“It’s a test of our global system where all nations ought to share in our collective responsibilities, because the vast majority of refugees are hosted by just 10 countries who are bearing a very heavy burden – among them Turkey, Pakistan, Lebanon, Iran, Ethiopia”.
