LOS ANGELES, Jan. 7 /Xinhua-PRNewswire/ -- Another New Year has dawned and it is customary to extend New Year's greetings. The time has come, however, to ponder whether our greetings are only limited to words. The New Year is always a time for reflection and a time to look forward and anticipate what challenges and opportunities lie ahead; it is also a time to make plans for responding to challenges and opportunities in the coming year.
At the beginning of the new millennium at the Millennium Summit, leaders of all nations pledged to provide hope. They set themselves precise, time-bound targets -- the Millennium Development Goals (the "Goals") -- which range from cutting worldwide poverty in half to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015. To this end they signed the Millennium Declaration.
Millions of lives, and the hopes of billions, rest on the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals and other pledges to fight poverty, disease, illiteracy, inequality, and on development in the years ahead. To meet these goals would cost only a fraction of what our world spends on weapons of war. Yet it would bring hope to billions, and greater security to us all.
Since the Millennium Summit, we have not lived up to these pledges. We let ourselves be swept along by the tide of war and division; and achieving the Millennium Development Goals remains a daunting challenge for many Least Developed Countries ("LDCs"), including 34 LDCs in Africa. Despite significant progress of some LDCs on separate goals and targets, the overall progress of the LDCs group on Goals has been extremely slow. Furthermore, if the current trend persists the number of people living in extreme poverty in the LDCs will increase from 334 million in 2000 to 471 million in 2015.
At this New Years we just passed the midpoint in the global effort to achieve these Goals by 2015, our scorecard is uneven. Some regions -- particularly sub-Saharan Africa -- are clearly not on track. This should worry every single one of us. After all, reaching the Goals is not only vital to building better, healthier and decent lives for millions of people around the world, it is also essential to global peace and security.
Let us begin here, in this New Year's, to rekindle that "Monterrey Spirit." Let us renew our commitment to free our fellow human beings from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of poverty and inequality. A strong and sustained effort now can mean the difference between the success and failure of our collective endeavour to create a better, more peaceful and more prosperous world for all.
On this New Year I call on governments at all levels, international organizations, civil society groups, and the private sector to implement this framework and invest in poverty reduction and disaster prevention, in order to build resilient communities and save lives.
We must not squander that opportunity.
Nor must we forget why we pledged. All people have a right to human
dignity. That is why we pledged.
All people have a right to control their own lives. Yet for billions
poverty snatches that right away. That is why we pledged.
People have a right to opportunity -- in education, in trade, in
building a better future for their children. That is why we pledged.
We the leaders of all nations, We must not fail them
The Chair Person of EurOrient Financial Group, Mr. Ron Nechemia said, "We cannot go on with 'business as usual'. Millions of lives quite literally hang in the balance. Achieving the Millennium Development Goals and delivering on our promises is above all a test of our moral obligations. We should not allow commitments to become words that symbolize broken promises."
"On behalf of my colleagues at EurOrient Financial Group, I extend my sincere wishes for a productive, development-oriented 2008!" said Mr. Ron Nechemia, Officer-in-Charge, EurOrient Financial Group.
EurOrient Financial Group
EurOrient Financial Group is a private sector global development finance institution. Its mission is to mobilize financial, technical and human resources for the benefit of developing economies seeking sustainable economic development and poverty reduction.
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