Csaba Korosi (at the podium and on the screens), president of the 77th session of the UN General Assembly, speaks at the first plenary of the 77th session of the General Assembly at the UN headquarters in New York.

77th session of UN General Assembly opens

UNITED NATIONS (Xinhua) -- The 77th session of the UN General Assembly was declared open on Tuesday by new General Assembly President Csaba Korosi.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, in his opening remarks, called for solidarity among member states to address common challenges.
The many challenges that defined the 76th session of the General Assembly are still very much around as the new session starts, he said. “We face a world in peril across our work to advance peace, human rights and sustainable development, from conflicts and climate change to a broken global financial system that is failing developing countries, to poverty, inequality and hunger, to divisions and mistrust.”
“Addressing common challenges will require continued solidarity as we demonstrate the great promise and potential of this organisation,” he added.
The United Nations is the home of cooperation. And the General Assembly is the life within that home. The months ahead will continue testing the strength and durability of the multilateral system this organisation represents, he told delegates. “And the world is looking to the members of the assembly to use all of the tools at your disposal to negotiate and forge consensus and solutions: debate, deliberation, diplomacy. These eternal tools represent the best pathway to a better, more peaceful world.”
In his opening remarks, Korosi called for solutions through solidarity, sustainability, and science.
The only way to achieve better outcomes is to transform, he said. “The contours of the transformation we need are already known. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the Sendai Framework (for disaster risk reduction), the Paris Agreement (on climate change), and Our Common Agenda (proposed by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres), all point us in the right direction. What remains to be seen is whether we will deliver.”
The world is looking to the United Nations for answers. As the world body’s chief deliberative body, the General Assembly bears a special responsibility, he said.
“Having begun my tenure as president, I aim to harness the great talents of this community of member states in forging the systemic solutions needed to transform our world. In accepting this privilege, I vowed to serve as an agent of multilateralism, multiculturalism, and multilingualism,” said the president. “I pledge that impartiality would be the hallmark of our operation. My team and I will do our best to push for ‘Solutions Through Solidarity, Sustainability and Science,’ the motto I’ve chosen for this presidency.”
He vowed to stand firm on the principles of the UN Charter, which brought member states together 77 years ago and hold them together today.
“Encoded in international law, they (the principles of the UN Charter) provide us with a solid foundation from which to build. From here, I wish to pursue integrated approaches and enhance the role of science in our decision-shaping. I will work to foster measurable progress in the sustainability transformation and cultivate solidarity we need to achieve breakthroughs or to avert further crises and disasters,” he said.
He promised to engage closely with the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council, and other relevant UN bodies to further the critical revitalisation process, and pursue the ongoing key reforms led by Guterres to make the General Assembly and the United Nations as a whole fit-for-purpose.
The United Nations was created out of the ashes of war and destruction, with the intention of being a well of solutions, said Korosi. “Responding to humanity’s most pressing challenges demands that we work together and that we reinvigorate inclusive, networked and effective multilateralism, and focus on what unites us. It is our mission to come together when there are disagreements, and to build bridges when there are deep divides,” he said.

(Latest Update September 15, 2022)