Position Paper - Argentina

[Afrodite Papanastasiou]

It is widely acknowledged that the world economy is now mired in the most severe financial crisis since the Great Depression. The need for international policy coordination and cooperation is more pressing than ever. This Conference offers an opportunity to take a fresh and unbiased look at monetary and financial issues, as the UN General Assembly is the most adequate place to get together developed and less developed countries to discuss the current global economic crisis.

As immediate solutions are being worked out, it remains important to understand the systemic causes of the present crisis, which relate to weaknesses in global economic governance. Understanding the deeper causes makes it clear that much more fundamental change is needed to reform the international financial system. Thus, the Argentine Government will make strong demands for a complete reform of the international financial institutions, especially the IMF - as well as other international financial institutions - and a stricter regulation on the credit rating companies, along with a reform of the present international reserve system, away from the almost exclusive reliance on the United States dollar.

Although the Argentine economic crisis (1999–2002) is over, many challenges remain for our country. The main challenge we will have to face is the renewed threat of high inflation, as a quarter of the Argentine population still lives in poverty, and any rise in the prices of basic commodities is likely to have a devastating impact. Argentina is expected to devote more attention to foreign policy, continuing to maintain close ties with other Latin American countries such as Brazil and Venezuela while at the same time seeking to ease the at times strained ties with Washington.

Since the restoration of the democratic system in 1983, Argentina assumed the promotion of human rights as a matter of principle, showing consistent political will to address the human rights violations that occurred during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship. Being a State-Party of nine out of twelve basic instruments of the universal system for the promotion and the protection of human rights, Argentina wishes to contribute in a decisive way to the UN’s institutional priority to human rights issues so as to continue to improve the protection standards for all the peoples in the world.