French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday that the world faces a stark choice: “Do we want to live…with a return to the law of the jungle – or do we want to live in a civilized international society?”
Addressing the General Assembly he said France was committed to both the UN itself and a revival of multilateralism to “tackle common challenges together”.
Don’t give in to defeatism
Enumerating crises and wars, he declared, “we will not yield to defeatism.”
International law does not describe reality, but rather outlines the limits of acceptable behaviour, he said, adding that the forgotten lessons of the 20th century can be seen in the current wave of “industrialised” war crimes and a new era of barbarism.
“The Geneva Conventions are being dismantled”, he lamented, citing Sudan’s El Fasher and the destruction of Gaza, among other humanitarian crises. “There cannot be peace without justice,” though, and France will continue to support the International Court of Justice (ICJ), he said.
“We simply cannot accept this new order of impunity which some are trying to erect.”
In this vein, he expressed support for Security Council reform to boost effectiveness, which includes opening it up to new members – especially from Africa – and to allow it to take action in the face of mass violations of international law.
A significant portion of his speech was advocating for reducing divides between the North and the South, which he said was crucial to address climate change, health and development.
He acknowledged this would require reopening a dialogue about common history, cultural relationships and restorative justice.
Against violations of sovereignty
The French President strongly condemned “double standards” on the issue of sovereignty: “How many times have we heard that people's sovereignty mattered in Europe, but that when it comes to the Middle East and Africa we could just as well do without it?”, he said.
“Every time some States wish to run roughshod over the will of certain peoples, to change a system, to topple a regime, every time this resulted in ever greater chaos,” he emphasised.
He reiterated support for Ukraine in the face of the Russian invasion and for restoring freedom of navigation in the Hormuz Strait.
He also stressed his support to Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank, saying that though some claim peace has been achieved in Gaza, humanitarian corridors have not materialised – earning him a round of applause.
AI independence
A last section of his speech focused on the dangers of AI, and specifically on the fact that the vast majority of people and countries appear to have no voice in the debate over AI regulation.
He stressed that it should not be left only to the US and China, and a handful of private actors. The stakes are too high, he added, over a technology which could threaten “the security of our States, of our hospitals, of our banks”.
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