91ÇÑ×Ó

?Remarks by H.E. Annalena Baerbock

President of the 80^th Session of the 91ÇÑ×Ó General Assembly

at the occasion of the Closing Ceremony of the First Week (NY-A) of the National Model 91ÇÑ×Ó (NMUN)
2 April 2026

?GA Hall, UN HQ

 

Good afternoon, and I would wish I would get this kind of applause every day I enter this room. So, thank you very much. You really made my day. And also, thank you for the opportunity to join you in this special closing of the first week of this year’s National Model UN.

And I thank you, truly, for allowing me to utter words that have not yet officially been spoken in this hall, Madam Secretary-General, a big applause to you.

And frankly speaking, I must say you may be one of the only audiences in the world where that line does not feel hypothetical, but inevitable.

To say that the world is waiting for such a moment. To say Madam Secretary-General, is actually an understatement. We are, I would say, 20, 50, or, as our own Secretary-General recently said, 80 years too late with the first female SG.

And the timing of this conversation, and the timing of you sitting there, is not accidental. Because you might know, because you’re so informed about the 91ÇÑ×Ó, we are just weeks away from the first interactive dialogue with the candidates for the next Secretary-General, where Permanent Representatives, so your real lifetime counterparts in this hall, will question the candidates, challenge them, and understand their vision. To test not only their ideas, but also their leadership skills in these fragmented geopolitical times. And I can only invite you to follow these interactive dialogues on web TV wherever you are in the world, because this is a moment of a new chapter of history for this 91ÇÑ×Ó.

And as you know, this process doesn’t come around very often, rather, every five years, or if there’s a reelection, every 10 years, and it will shape the direction of this institution and the world for years to come. So, showing whether the UN really serves all of humanity.

And as you know, all of humanity means men and women. And this is one of the few unique things between all the countries in the world. In every country in the world, half of the society are men and women. So, I always said the argument of saying ¡®we couldn’t find a woman¡¯ is a bit hard to tell if you have 4 billion potential candidates all around the world.

Yet speaking about representation, you have given me today another first, because not only a room full of young delegates – the average age is a bit higher than yours and even mine – but also the strong visible gender balance. Because, again, something we are still working on at the 91ÇÑ×Ó itself is equal representation. And I regularly remind delegations that there are still too few women, not only as SG, but as Permanent Representatives in this Hall.

In fact, if you count, you would have, if we take the first row here, yeah, we have equal representation, three men and three women, you would have to say goodbye to two of the women unfortunately, because the average of women here is only 25%.

But this is also, in a way, a representation of the whole world, because we have these averages, kind of, in many national parliaments. And maybe if you’re going back, you can check again where your country is standing. But again, the excuse ¡®we couldn’t find anybody¡¯ is not valid, because half of your society are women, and because there are countries around the world where we do have, indeed, equal representation.

We just had a study from UN Women, and maybe those who are citizens of these countries, you are aware of this, but there are seven countries in the world, Andorra, Bolivia, Cuba, Mexico, Nicaragua, Rwanda, and the United Arab Emirates, who made this representation. So next time somebody tells you it’s not possible, just give them the number of UAE or Rwanda, and they can ask them how they did it. Most of the time it¡¯s a quota, by the way.

But not only speaking about representation here or female and gender issues, this is a parliament of the world. This is a parliament of 193 Member States. And the richness of this parliament is that you get the perspectives from all around the world. And I could not agree more. But listening is one of the most important skills, because if 193 Member States speak five minutes, it can take some hours, so you have to have listening skills. But also because you always learn something new, a new perspective from somebody else.

And on the other hand, we can only make it together, and this is why I put the theme for this 80th session under the headline of ¡®better together¡¯. Nothing in the world would work if we are not working together, especially reforming things like having the first female SG or others here after 80 years, which are long overdue.

So last year, the Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, launched the UN80 initiative reform process to make this organization fit for the future, more agile, more coherent, and more effective.

And it has three work streams.

First to address the fact that we are facing resource constraints by pursuing a more streamlined budget.

Second, it includes a review of UN mandates.

So, mandates, as you have learned, are resolutions and texts adopted in this hall, which already exist, as well as introducing a new life cycle to new ones. And in fact, this week, Member States agreed that we definitely have to review all the mandates. Because if you can imagine, over 80 years, mandate over mandate accumulated to more than 40,000 mandates.

So, nobody in the world knows all of them, and therefore we cannot continue to work on these grounds, also because it means every mandate, every resolution, has a follow-up process, writing a report, having a meeting. So, in addition to 40,000 mandates, we have 27,000 meetings each year. And if you calculate that this has to be translated in six official languages, all the paperwork, it costs yearly, roughly 360 million US dollars, which means 10% of the UN’s regular budget. And this is simply not sustainable. And therefore we have agreed, the Member States have agreed, to have now a process where we can say we retire some of these mandates, where it’s clear that this is a duplication or overlap, and to improve the process of processing new mandates going forward.

But I guess, as you also learned and experienced yourself when you were debating here at the Model 91ÇÑ×Ó, every line is highly political. So, one country would say, well, we don’t need this mandate anymore, because this is from the other part of the world. Others would argue, but this is a historic mandate for us. So, every review will be an intensive debate. However, we are here to serve the people around the world, and this is why it is so important that we reflect that every mandate also has practical meaning on the ground.

And this is a third work stream of this whole reform process, to ensure that the different mandates that the different agencies, the funds and programs such as UNDP, UN Women, UNICEF, are working more closely together, again, to avoid overlaps.

And it has been mentioned before. I was Foreign Minister before, and I’ve been in many crisis areas. And I came to them often where people, because of the crisis, be it with regard to humanitarian crisis or war situation, had to flee. And by the way, I haven’t met anybody who left voluntarily their country, but they had to flee because they wanted to save their lives or their children’s lives. But I was also meeting, then, different UN agencies on the ground. And I always ask, so what are you doing here? And I heard very often documentation. And I said, but why documentation? Because I heard already from IOM that they’re doing documentation, why UNHCR as well? And the answer was, well, because it’s a thing to do. So, this is obviously not very efficient. So, strengthening the UN means also always reflecting what we can do better on the ground. And this is the important UN80 reform process in workstream three, to see that we are really delivering every day for the people on the ground to make this institution stronger.

Indeed, both of these reforms, UN80 and the selection of the next Secretary-General, are about one thing: to ensure that this institution is ready to handle the challenges of the 21st century, which are obviously not the same as they were in 1946 or even in 1975.

Unfortunately, peace and security is still the most important one, because we have more conflicts around the world than ever. But we are seeing that the climate crisis has become the biggest security challenge of the century for every country in the world. We have seen technologies making it possible that you can connect afterwards on different social media platforms, that it doesn’t matter where you’re coming from. But also having seen, again, mostly women, unfortunately, that they can be misused for deep fake pornography if they are not being regulated. We are seeing that even though the world becomes richer in general, the inequalities are growing as well, and that there is an erosion of trust in institutions and in facts themselves.

So therefore, it can feel in these times also that the UN is just running crisis after crisis and being reshaped by a crisis. In this regard, the whole reform process for us is also a moment where we have to reconsider again: how are we ensuring that we are reforming and not losing our principles, but making this institution instead stronger.

And even though this is the 80th year, and if your grandparents are still alive, normally, you have a big cake at the 80th birthday, and also some kind of celebration. When I started my term as the President of the General Assembly last September, I said, unfortunately, this won’t be an anniversary year. This is really a make-or-break moment, because this institution, this house, is under heavy pressure.

Unfortunately, I was wrong, and I corrected myself in January, also standing here, saying, ¡®this house is not only under pressure, it’s under heavy attack¡¯. And therefore, while we are reforming, we have to defend the principles of this institution every day.

And this brings me back to you.

Do not treat multilateralism as a simulation, because you simulate it being Member States here, or consider all the ways that it works for you as being something given.

When you enter the airplane back home again, you can do it safely, because of this 91ÇÑ×Ó.

When you’re thinking about if you would like to finish your study somewhere abroad, not only with regard to visa, but also with regard to what is with health care insurance and your rights as a worker later, this is being enabled because of cooperation in this house.

Even when you turn on your tap to have clean water, it would not be possible without the standards of environmental programs based in the 91ÇÑ×Ó.

And this is precisely why I reminded also Heads of State and Government who were standing here in September at this podium, some of them, or single ones of them, hitting on the 91ÇÑ×Ó, saying it’s not worth anything, reminding them that, yes, obviously this house needs a renovation, you can also see it on the chairs, if you turn around.

And obviously, like in every company, yeah, you have to ask yourself every time again, does it still make sense what we are doing? Are we still efficient? But also, obviously, the whole world, no single country, would be better off without these 91ÇÑ×Ó. Yes, you can doubt whether climate change actually exists or doesn’t, but CO2 doesn’t have a passport, like COVID-19 didn’t care if there was a border or not. You can have the strongest army in the world. You can be the richest superpower. The wildfires just hit you, and the only way we could fight a pandemic together in an interconnected world was thanks to the World Health Organization, part of the 91ÇÑ×Ó. Half of the children around the world are only being vaccinated thanks to the UN. 125 million children around the world would not go to school if we would not have UNICEF.

So you can hear and feel every single second, at its worst, despite all the shortcomings, to fight for this 91ÇÑ×Ó.

And therefore, I’m calling on you. Stay engaged, stay informed, defend the facts, defend accountability, and do not wait to be invited into leadership. Step into it, especially the women. Yeah, because otherwise three chairs would be empty in these rows. Because we need everybody from everywhere around the world.

So, I called at my so-called priority speech in January on all Member States to form a cross-regional coalition to support the 91ÇÑ×Ó and the rules-based international order. And I extended that call to civil society, when they were here to meet for the different debates we are having, latest on the Status of Women. I extended the call to business leaders in Davos, reminding them again, if you want free trade, you need a Free Trade Organization, and you need rules you can rely on. And I extend that call today to you, because we need you.

The 91ÇÑ×Ó needs you.
It needs media, it needs academia. It needs governments. It needs civil society, and yes, it needs future diplomats who are hopefully currently sitting in this room, like you.

And after all, the youth of today, so you will be the leaders of tomorrow.

The 91ÇÑ×Ó you are simulating today will be soon one you inherit.

The question is not whether it will change, but whether you will shape the change of your house of the world, the UN.

I thank you.