They did so against a backdrop of mounting bloodshed and a failing cease-fire in Syria, escalating attacks around the world by Islamic extremists, and millions of people fleeing fighting and poverty.
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White House officials said Obama had been mindful of the fact that his United Nations speech was one of his final opportunities to define his leadership on the world stage. Present in this hall today are representatives of governments that have ignored, facilitated, funded, participated in, or even planned and carried out, atrocities inflicted by all sides of the Syrian conflict against Syrian civilians. “Many groups have killed many innocents, but none more so than the government of Syria, which continues to barrel-bomb neighbourhoods and systematically torture thousands of detainees”.
The Syrian statement noted that the address deviated “extremely far from the rules of the United Nations charter”, while stressing that the worldwide body had not achieved anything towards resolving any conflicts during Ban’s mandate.
Both Syria and Russian Federation denied they were behind the raids that struck the convoy.
As they await action from world leaders in NY, a group of volunteers in London laid out a “life jacket graveyard” Monday to draw attention to the plight of thousands of migrants who’ve lost their lives attempting hazardous boat crossings in the Mediterranean.
More than 65 million people in the world are displaced, the highest number on record since the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) began collecting statistics, according to the White House. Obama leaves the White House on January 20 after eight years. Still, he stuck to his insistence that diplomatic efforts and not military solutions are the key to resolving Syria’s war and other conflicts.
“Despite enormous progress, as people lose trust in institutions, governing becomes more hard and tensions between nations become more quick to surface”, he said.
Obama, a golfer and avid basketball player, didn’t say whether he would take up the secretary-general’s challenge – or what his future plans are. “Just as failure to act in the past – for example, by turning away Jews fleeing Nazi Germany – is a stain on our collective conscience, I believe history will judge us harshly if we do not rise to this moment”.
Ban Ki-moon used his final address to the General Assembly to unleash his outrage at leaders who have been supporting the five-year-long conflict in Syria.
In an oblique reference to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who has suggested temporarily banning Muslim immigrants, Obama said buying into the notion that Muslim immigrants pose an inherent risk would reinforce terrorists’ propaganda. But he added that false perceptions of Islam in the West were breeding further intolerance.
“I promise you, we will all be better for it”, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said of welcoming refugees.
It is a theme that Democrat Hillary Clinton has put at the forefront of her campaign for president, casting herself as the natural continuation of Mr Obama’s legacy.
Mr Obama warned that the forces of globalisation have exposed “deep fault lines” across the globe, calling for a “course correction” to ensure that nations and their peoples do not retreat into a more sharply divided world.
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“Powerful patrons that keep feeding the war machine also have blood on their hands”.
