At U.N., leaders spin virus storylines
The subject: coronavirus. The status: urgent. The solutions: as diverse as the nations they lead.
With the 75th annual U. N. General Assembly reduced to recorded speeches because of the pandemic, leaders are using this week as an opportunity to depict the pandemic from the vantage points of their nations and themselves— and present their visions of efforts to fight the virus and advocate what they believe must be done.
A smattering of myriad ideas from speeches on Tuesday, the first day of the general debate:
• South African President Cyril Ramaphosa called for a suspension of interest payments on African nations’ debt and renewed focus on eradicating global poverty.
• Chilean President Sebastián Piñera called on powerful nations to work together and stop generating “a worrisome lack of leadership.”
• Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte echoed a call from many leaders when he said that once an effective vaccine is developed, it must be made available to all nations.
Not surprisingly in such speeches, aimed at both domestic audiences and the international community, heads of state were presenting their own efforts in favorable light while sometimes harshly criticizing other coun
tries or taking jabs at the United Nations.
This year’s theme — “reaffirming our collective commitment to multilateralism” — comes at a time of extreme physical isolation between citizens in respective countries and between nations, a moment when international travel has declined sharply. It also comes as the world approaches 1 million deaths from the virus since December, adding urgency to the search for solutions.
“The leaders of our nations are not personally present. They will not be able to interact with each other,” General Assembly President Volkan Bozkir, a Turkish diplomat, said in opening Tuesday’s session. “But our need for deliberation is higher than ever.”
Despite this year’s theme, speeches by leaders of some of the world’s most powerful nations have thus far been peppered with initiatives that sound more go-italone than collaborative, though all gave nods toworking together.
Russian President Vladimir Putin went so far as to offer U.N. personnel a coronavirus vaccine his country is developing. Chinese President Xi Jinping said a handful of vaccines were in phase 3 of clinical trials and that Beijing would give millions to a U.N. fund to combat the virus.
“1.4 billion Chinese, undaunted by COVID-19, have made all efforts to control the virus,” Xi said, underscoring how China had drastically slowed the spread after the virus was discovered in the Chinese city of Wuhan.