Prime Minister Paul Martin made his debut at the United Nations General Assembly on this date in 2004. It was a forum he knew well as he had visited his father, foreign minister Paul Martin Sr., a life-long proponent of the UN, there while a youth.
Prime Minister Martin called up the UN to usher in a new era to more effectively help the world’s peoples. “No matter how you come at it, the time has come for real reform of the United Nations, “the 21st Prime Minister said. “We must put aside narrow interests and work to common purpose to strengthen this universal institution, whose activities give force to our common humanity.
Four years ago, at the Millennium Summit, the leaders of the world agreed and I quote that “we have a duty...to all the world’s people, especially the most vulnerable…”. That duty will not be discharged, unless we, as governments speak to the dignity and freedom of every human being on earth, here at the world’s meeting place of nations.
You can watch Prime Minister Martin’s address to the UN at this link: https://media.un.org/photo/en/asset/oun7/oun7780233
Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.