Delivering the opening speech of the 78th Session of the United Nations General Assembly on Sept. 19, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres sounded the alarm over the growing divisions in the world “among economic and military powers, and between North and South, East and West.” He said that the world is “inching ever closer to a Great Fracture in economic and financial systems and trade relations … and potentially clashing security frameworks.”
Guterres’s dire warning is unfortunately an accurate description of the state of the world, and the discussions underway at the UNGA after its first two days of speeches. Leading spokesmen for the Global Majority, such as BRICS members Brazil and South Africa, issued an urgent call for a new international architecture to replace the bankrupt IMF financial system and its drive for war; but they were met with emphatic intransigence by Western advocates of looting and imperial aggression, such as U.S. President Biden, Ukraine’s Zelenskyy, and Poland’s Duda.
“Our world is becoming unhinged. Geopolitical tensions are rising. Global challenges are mounting. And we seem incapable of coming together to respond,” Guterres began. “We confront a host of existential threats,” he added, and called for reforms of existing institutions, such as the United Nations and its Security Council. “That means reforming the Security Council in line with the world of today. It means redesigning the international financial architecture so that it becomes truly universal and serves as a global safety net for developing countries in trouble.
