Migiro applauds agenda of French-speaking bloc and its cooperation with UN

Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro today encouraged representatives of the world organization of French-speaking countries to continue to play their key role in pursuing goals they have in common with the United Nations, ranging from democracy and human rights to peace and development.

“As elected representatives of the peoples of the French-speaking world, you have a key role to play as a bridge between governments and citizens, and between the local and global,” Ms. Migiro told the Parliamentary Assembly of La Francophonie as it opened its meeting at UN Headquarters in New York.

She noted, in particular, the partnership of La Francophonie with the UN in efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a set of targets to slash extreme poverty and other global ills by the year 2015, as well as the organization’s efforts to help bring about the stability that development requires.

“At a time when many Francophone countries are grappling with devastating conflicts that could erase the gains made toward the MDGs, I am encouraged that one of the main topics of your meeting today will be political crises in the French speaking world,” the Deputy Secretary-General said.

In that light, she noted the organization’s active involvement in the political crisis on the island of Anjouan in the Comoros and its support for peace-building efforts in Burundi, the Central African Republic (CAR) and Guinea-Bissau and for the restoration of constitutional order in Guinea and Mauritania.

More than half of all UN Member States hold either full-fledged or observer-status membership of La Francophonie, which signed a cooperation agreement with the UN in October 2006.