🇵🇼Surangel WhippsPalau · UNGA 81 speech

Mr. President, congratulations on your successful election as President of the 81st Session of the UN General Assembly. Secretary General, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen, Ali, and warm greetings from the people of Palau. Secretary General Antonio Guterres, thank you for your leadership and service to the United Nations. Your climate leadership, steadfast defense of multilateralism, international law, human dignity, and the voices of the vulnerable carries a special meaning for small island developing states. I stand before this assembly for a people whose future depends on a healthy ocean and a stable climate, and the sovereign right to determine their own path. For us, sovereignty is lived in our ability to feed our people from healthy oceans, power our homes independently from distant fuel markets, and protect our shorelines from rising seas and chart our own path. It is a responsibility that grows more urgent each day, especially as UNEP's latest findings make clear that the world is now certain to exceed 1.5. This reality must strengthen our resolve to deliver what we have promised, prepare our communities, for the impacts science tells us are inevitable. Small island states, young people, scientists, civil society, indigenous communities, and responsible partners have already raised climate ambition, accelerated the shift to renewable energy, and exposed the true cost of inaction. We have called for ambition that matches science, demonstrated that ocean stewardship can protect while supporting livelihoods and insisted on a stronger voice for small island states in decisions that shape our future. Pacific leaders have charted a practical roadmap through the Unlocking Blue Pacific Prosperity, UBPP, launched at COP28 and reinforced by the Pacific leaders, ocean statement adopted in Palau, UBPP unites 22 Pacific countries and territories to mobilize accessible, catalytic, catalytic investment for 100% sustainable ocean management, robust food systems, and resilience, livelihoods. Advancing our shared 30 by 30 commitment. We continue to seek and expand investment to the UBBP. To meet its goals and deliver lasting resilience for our communities. Palau is translating that UBBB vision into national action. We have launched our sustainable ocean policy that commits 100% effective, science-based, and adaptive management of our ocean. balancing protection with production to deliver the optimal benefits for our people. In line with this effort, we support, with support from partners like Japan, we are working to develop fishing ports and other critical infrastructure to truly capture the value of resources harvested in our waters. As chair of the Pacific Island Forum and AOSIS, and through Palau's leadership on the high-level panel for sustainable ocean economy, we continue to call for an ocean agenda that meets the scale of this challenge. But, Mr. President, the task now is delivery. We need financing that reaches communities without adding debt, adaptation finance that is accessible to countries already bearing the cost of the problems they did not create, and full support of the loss and damage and the special circumstances of SIDS. This means grant-based and concessional finance, grid readiness and storage, productive energy use, and support that respects our circumstances while enabling delivery at scale. Those who contributed the least to this climate crisis yet confront the worst threats of rising sea levels must not be burdened with debt simply to purchase a life jacket for their survival. International financial institutions must look beyond income and account for vulnerabilities of SIDS, Climate exposure, remoteness, narrow economies, and limited access to affordable finance must be considered. The Antigua and Barbuda agenda for SIDS provides a strong roadmap for resilience, but requires urgent, predictable, and scaled-up support. The Pacific Resilience Facility is one practical answer, the PRF. Endorsed by the Pacific leaders, the PRF is the first Pacific-led, owned, and managed regional financing facility dedicated to climate and disaster resilience, and the first international financial institution collectively owned by the Pacific focused on turning resources into real community-level resilience. The PRF reflects the kind of capital the world should support. Resilience is also about safeguarding public health. And I commend Palau's First Lady for advancing efforts to combat tobacco and nicotine use with a focus on our youth. Her efforts led to the formal request to the UN Secretary General to initiate a WHO review of nicotine as a psychotropic substance. Globally, nicotine claims over 7 million lives annually and more than a billion trapped in addiction. Protecting our future requires expanding prevention, enhancing cessation support, and enacting strong policies to diminish the appeal and affordability of these harmful products. No country should have to choose between health of its children and the commercial interest of an industry that is built on addiction. We call for stronger international cooperation to protect young people from nicotine dependence and to put public health before profit. Resilience must also transform into how we power our homes, move our people, and connect our islands. Energy security is climate security and national security. Through the Manabara call to action, the Pacific reaffirmed a shared vision of 100% renewable energy. and a just, inclusive, and equitable transition away from fossil fuels. This is not about reducing emissions. It is about reducing vulnerability to imported fuel, external shocks, and prices we do not control. Palau is carrying that regional commitment into national action. Our latest commitment targets A 44% reduction in fossil fuel use by 2035, supported by renewable energy generation and practical policies that make the transition affordable and reliable. Our energy future reflects a larger truth. Resilience requires partnership, shaped by our priorities and respects our sovereignty. How we protect our ocean, confront climate change, and power our islands leads directly to how the world engages with us. Partnership must never become pressure, and assistance must never come at the cost of the nation's values, institutions, or the freedom to choose. Sovereignty is not isolation. It is the freedom to cooperate through mutual respect, transparency, accountability, dialogue, and international law. This principle matters because we have seen what can happen when tensions build, when concerns are ignored, and when channels for dialogue are left too narrow for the challenges before us. The Russia Ukraine war is a painful reminder of the tragic human toll that occurs when diplomacy gives way to conflict and how challenging it is to deescalate tensions once violence erupts. The Strait of Hormuz situation demonstrates how quickly disruption in an important waterway threatens international stability, energy security. and trade worldwide. Reaffirming the primary responsibility of the UN Charter to maintain global peace and security, we uphold the sovereignty of Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, and condemn the actions of Iran to jeopardize maritime security and aim to obstruct, close, and interfere with international navigation through the strait. At our Pacific Leaders Meeting in Palau, leaders expressed deep concern that China's ballistic missile test overflew several Pacific nations without adequate notice. Let me remind you, our region must never be treated as an empty expanse for strategic competition or test of military power. The Pacific is home to peoples, communities, cultures, fisheries, and ecosystems. It is the foundation of our security and the source of our nourishment and lifeline for the global community. In the face of these risks, the Pacific way is to address tensions before they become crisis, make room for dialogue before disagreement, becomes conflict. Seek inclusion

than isolation and uphold respect, restraint, and international law. The Pacific is our home, not a theater for geopolitical competition. It must remain an ocean of peace where nations meet in cooperation, international law is respected, and the security of the Pacific peoples is never compromised. In Palau, we say we are a friend to all. We choose our partners based on our shared values of democracy, human rights, and a rules-based international order, principles that underpin our friendship with Taiwan, a trusted partner that can contribute even more fully if given the space to do so. The UN Charter begins with the commitment we the peoples. Yet the UN marginalizes Taiwan's 23 million people, disregarding that foundational purpose. We stand with like-minded partners in calling for the reversal of misinterpretations of the rules and procedures that have constrained Taiwan's meaningful participation in this body. Under the UN Charter, small states are sovereign states with the right to determine their own future, choose their partners, and pursue development that serves their people. We urge all parties to preserve peace and stability, resolve differences peacefully, and choose dialogue over escalation. Beyond politics, and policy, one truth should unite us. Our children and their children deserve a world that is safe, healthy, and clean. For that reason, our discussions here and beyond must lead to action, action that protects the conditions in which every child can live, grow, and thrive. We acknowledge while not yet at the scale required, that the architecture is being built, political momentum is growing, and resources are beginning to mobilize, even amidst a complex geopolitical landscape. Our traditional wisdom reminds us, "Be strong and do not give up, the shore is near." The promise of multilateralism is that even the smallest can be heard and that the many voices shaped by different histories and experiences can move toward a common shore. In Palau, we also say, "Atoroy a waiul." Knowledge is like ocean waves. It comes in many forms and sizes, yet no wave overpowers another. and they ultimately reach the same shore. Let us leave this assembly committed to multilateralism that honors every voice, values every form of knowledge, and carries us toward a safer, healthier, and more peaceful world. Ms. Hsu-Lang and I thank you.