REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE ON THE OCCASION OF NEW YEAR GREETINGS BY THE DIPLOMATIC CORPS
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE ON THE OCCASION OF NEW YEAR GREETINGS BY THE DIPLOMATIC CORPS ÁRAS AN UACHTARÁIN
A Oirircis, A Oirirceasa is a Uaisle Uile.
Cuireann sé an áthas orm agus ar mo fhear chéile fáilte a chur, rombhaibh go léir go hÁras an Uachtaráin. Tá mé an bhuioch as an beannachtaí a chuir sibh romhainn agus roimh muintir na hÉireann uilig. Guím sonas, síochaín agus sláinte oraibh. Tá súil agam go mbeidh blian nua faoi mhaise agaibh go léir.
Your Excellency, Excellencies, ladies, gentlemen, boys and girls.
My thanks to the diplomatic corps for the kind greetings which you and your respective countries have offered to my husband, Martin and to myself and through us, to the people of Ireland. Each card, each letter reinforces our membership of the common human family and as we gather today in this first month of the year 2000. I wish each of you and the nations and peoples you represent, peace, health and prosperity. Keeping in touch with each other is an important part of developing good, healthy, respectful relationships and an occasion like this offers its own distinct opportunity for cementing old friendships and building up new ones. A very special welcome to the families of the diplomatic corps. It is lovely to see you here in Áras an Uachtaráin. And of course there is a particular welcome to those who have recently arrived in Ireland and who are just beginning to find their feet. I hope that for all of you Ireland is a comfortable and a welcoming place where the stranger quickly becomes a friend.
It’s a good time to be in Ireland for we start this third Millennium with much good news to report. The past year has seen momentous events take place on the island of Ireland, bringing us even closer to the lasting peace and reconciliation that all people of goodwill have longed to see. The fresh beginning promised in the Good Friday Agreement is now underway and the institutions which will carry forward this exciting new dispensation have all made an energetic and convincing start to their historic work. A comprehensive peace based on justice, equality, respect and human rights is putting down its roots, ready to grow and blossom in the years to come.
We are privileged to be part of an evolving and radically different landscape, the lasting legacy of all those who committed themselves to the pursuit of peace over many hard and at times discouraging years. To them we owe an enormous debt and indeed we acknowledge that we owe much to the tenacious support and encouragement of our friends throughout the world who stood beside us through dark hours, and willed us on to create the bright future which lies ahead. There are those who see in the resolution of the centuries old Irish conflict a glimmer of hope for a world convulsed by violent conflict in which the life chances of men, women and children are outrageously squandered.
In 1999 we watched as avoidable, unnecessary conflicts plunged millions of our brother and sister human beings into living nightmares. We continue to witness them as we start this Millennium year. The human cost has been horrific.
The responsibility of the United Nations to maintain international peace and security has been severely tested in some of these conflicts, but that organisation remains the world’s best hope of responding effectively to the political and humanitarian crises which bring misery and despair to so many. In September next, the leaders of the one hundred and eighty eight Member States of the United Nations will gather in New York on the occasion of the Millennium Summit. A sombre look back at the blood-soaked century just gone and at the toxin of violence which has already leached from that century into this must surely concentrate the minds and will of all who attend that Summit. We pray they will produce an action-oriented outcome which will equip the United Nations with the moral and political authority, a fresh new millennium empowerment, to confront the challenges of war, poverty and disease wherever they arise.
Throughout 1999, as you are aware, the Irish Government have been actively pursuing Ireland’s candidacy for election to non-permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council for the term 2001-2002. Ireland’s candidacy is based on our active commitment to the broad activities of the UN, especially in peace-keeping development, disarmament and human rights. We believe that it is important that smaller member States of the UN, as well as larger ones, should have the opportunity to make their contribution to the vital work of the Security Council. I know that the Government is deeply gratified by the degree of support which our candidacy has attracted from countries in all regions of the world.
Here in Ireland our recent economic success gives us great hope and encouragement that there now exists a generation with the imagination and the resources to put an end to poverty and marginalisation. Our ambition is to see an end to the widening gap between rich and poor both here at home and across the globe.
The benefits of the new global economy, which as we in Ireland have seen can be hugely positive, must be available to the poorest countries too. With bold and imaginative leadership and a greater generosity of spirit we could transform the globe, bringing real hope to a world where too many still wait on the sidelines, paralysed by the weight of history, their gifts, their hopes, stillborn.
As we greet the new Millennium we must understand and deal with the forces which cause men, women and children in the poorest countries to flee their homelands and seek refuge elsewhere, including Ireland. Our own history tells of the devastating impact those forces have on people and place. Our exiles are found in every corner of the world and they were not always made as welcome as we would have wished. I hope that we in Ireland will treat with respect and compassion those who come here to seek a new start for themselves and their families.
Today's modern and dynamic Ireland surely owes much to its membership of that great adventure in peaceful democratic partnership Europe has ever known - the European Union. The coming years will see a considerable widening of the Union's embrace. As each of the applicant States prepares to join, we in Ireland wish them well and look forward with great enthusiasm to the greatly enriched cultural, political, social and economic vibrancy of the Union which enlargement will bring in its wake.
Although some of the things you and I have to deal with this coming year are already well signposted, none of us knows what the future holds for certain. We know, because experience has taught us, that many things can ambush us, test us, challenge us. There are things out there we cannot yet know which will do just that. Some of those things will touch us deeply and personally. In your work as ambassadors or diplomats presenting the face of your people to Ireland and explaining the face of Ireland to your homeland, I hope the days ahead will bring a minimum of bad things and a lot of very good things.
Few citizens realise the extent to which we rely for humanly decent international relations on the professionalism of the diplomatic corps and on more than that, on your capacity to befriend, to get to know, to be curious about your host nation and accurately articulate in describing it. Today it is important I acknowledge the debt we owe all of you and not just for that consummate professionalism, but also for the sacrifices you make in order to create and sustain this intricate yet delicate web of diplomatic endeavour on which rests so much. Many think your careers highly glamorous but you know another truth, the loneliness of starting afresh in a strange country and with a strange language or strange accent, the ache of leaving children or spouse or elderly parents behind, the demands on family life as work comes first. The families who are here are also owed thanks. While the chance of living deeply inside other cultures and worlds has many compensations and excitements, nonetheless it is hard on children to move away from their friends and schools, to start again with new curricula, new language and maybe to do that several times over the course of childhood. The challenges of a father’s or mother's career can force heroism and self-reliance of a high degree out of their children and spouses. These are not unimportant things. These are things we all carry deeply with us and so to the children and spouses we say a resounding thank you for the support role you play. Your experience of Ireland is also important, for in a special way, wherever you go or wherever life takes, you will in a certain sense be ambassadors for Ireland. I hope your time in Ireland, whether it is as an occasional visitor or temporary resident, will be happy and contented.
May I once again I thank your Excellency, Your Excellencies, for your kind greetings. Gúim rath agus sonas oraibh go léir.
Toast: “To the Heads of State here represented”.