AP
Thursday 27 September 2012
UNITED NATIONS: Egypt’s new President Muhammed Mursi debuts at the United Nations yesterday with a speech that will be closely watched by world leaders for clues about his democratic intentions and plans for lifting his country out of crippling poverty.
Mursi, an Islamist and key figure in the once-banned Muslim Brotherhood, is the first democratically-elected leader of the ancient land at the heart of the Arab world. He was sworn in June 30.
Another Arab leader making his first appearances at the UN General Assembly’s annual ministerial meeting after being swept into power by the Arab Spring revolutions was Yemen’s President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who took office in February after more than a year of political turmoil and is now trying to steer his country’s democratic transition. Hadi called on the UN to grant membership to Palestine and support a transfer of power in Syria.
“The only option for our brothers in Syria is to agree on an initiative ... for peaceful change and transfer of power through ballot boxes,” he said.
Mursi previewed his General Assembly remarks in a speech delivered Tuesday at former President Bill Clinton’s Global Initiative. Addressing the violence that raged across the Muslim world in response to a video produced in the US that denigrated Islam’s Prophet Muhammad, the Egyptian leader said freedom of expression must come with “responsibility.” He appeared to have been responding to President Barack Obama’s General Assembly speech earlier Tuesday in which the US leader again condemned the video but sternly defended the US Constitution’s guarantees of free speech.
At least 51 people were killed in violence that erupted last week in Muslim countries, including the US ambassador to Libya and three other Americans targeted in an attack on the US consulate in Benghazi.
Mursi said the video and the violent reaction to it demanded “reflection.” He said freedom of expression must be linked with responsibility, “especially when it comes with serious implications for international peace and stability.”
With no sign of an end to the Security Council’s paralysis over intervening to end the raging Syrian civil war, Germany’s UN Ambassador Peter Wittig said his country chose to focus the council’s ministerial session on something new and positive in the Mideast — “the emergence of the Arab League as a regional actor that has proved to be essential for conflict resolution.”
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