Mr. President,
 
We welcome your timely initiative in convening this High Level Thematic Debate on Peace and Security. Even as we celebrated 2015 as a success for multilateralism, the geopolitical climate in 2016 seems to be running into headwinds. Increasingly, there is talk of a feeling of pessimism about the present and even a sense of foreboding about the future.

2.    The ongoing exponential shrinking of our planet through the multiple strands of technology-driven globalisation including through IT, electronic media and now social media, instantaneous transfers of funds and ease of travel have all helped in unprecedented growth and benefits. Yet these very same inter-linkages are also now being used for the spread of radical propaganda, extremist ideologies, recruitment of followers beyond national boundaries and spread of terrorist networks.

3.    While we are increasingly aware of the growing inter-dependence of economies; there is insufficient realisation of the commonality of threat that these other challenges pose to our collective security.

4.    Terrorism does not fit into the conventional paradigm of threats to peace and security. Yet, today it affects us all, across continents, whether we are from developing or developed world. Terrorism thrives on and is sustained by its trans-boundary networks for ideology, recruitment, propaganda, funding, arms, training and sanctuary. However, the global community has failed to address this menace effectively. Here at the United Nations there is a disaggregated counter terrorism infrastructure with no effort to tie them together in a seamless weave under a high level functionary. We need to address this.

Mr. President

5.    The most frequently used tool to address complex and multidimensional challenges - Peace Keeping - has been blunted. Issues of sexual exploitation and abuse by peace keepers, rising concerns about safety and security of peace keepers, questions about perceptions about the impartiality of UN troops are all symptoms of peace keeping under great stress. We need to attend to these fault lines, if peace keeping is to remain a beacon of hope.

6.    At a more fundamental level, the recognition of the inherent connectedness of the globe through our climate or the global inter-linkage of water, food and energy and their implications for international peace and prosperity is improving only gradually. The adoption last year of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development has been a remarkable step. It remains to be seen whether it has been fully understood that sustainable development for all is actually in the interest of all even in the context of peace and security. If economic, social, environmental and other causes of international tension are now important to questions of peace and security then we need to address these holistically and not only on the basis of primacy to politics.

Mr. President,

7.    On the one hand we find a growing tendency where issues much broader than the conventional peace and security context are being considered as germane. Issues related to the international system of criminal justice, large scale human rights violations, and monitoring compliance with disarmament arrangements are brought onto the agenda of international peace and security stretching the canvas of collective action by the Security Council. At the same time, we are faced with efforts to spin issues of Reform of the Security Council in an endless manner.

8.    When the UN was created, its main focus was maintaining peace between the then established powers. The world has moved on. The centre of gravity of the globalised economy continues to shift in a profound way. Technological innovation & human mobility continues to transform societies. Today, the challenges are more diverse. Even as we update tools and improve our understanding of emerging threats a more representative global governance system is essential to deal effectively with today's concerns. If we do not do so we run the risk of making the UN ineffective and irrelevant in addressing the most important challenges of our times.