Mr. Bourita calls on the international community to redefine its priorities in the fight against non-state armed groups
The situation urgently requires the international community to redefine its priorities on strategic issues, foremost among them the fight against the growing threat posed by non-state armed groups, MFA Bourita said in a speech delivered on behalf of Morocco during the general debate of the 81st session of the U.N. General Assembly.
MFA Bourita outlined the main features of the current international landscape, marked by worsening acute and complex crises in which military, economic, energy and environmental dimensions are intertwined, as conflict increasingly becomes the prevailing pattern governing relations between States, amid persistent uncertainty that makes it difficult to assess how these crises will evolve.
He warned of the growing threat posed by non-state armed groups to the security, sovereignty and stability of States, as well as their efforts to expand their influence over maritime routes and straits, even disrupting international shipping.
MFA Bourita backed his warning with alarming figures showing that more than 200 million people worldwide now live under the control of such groups or in areas marked by fierce struggles for power, while more than 130 non-state armed groups have been classified as parties to armed conflicts.
The situation, he said, “clearly reflects the scale of this threat in a world that, over the past two decades, has spiralled into a state of growing insecurity and instability.”
Addressing the nature of these organizations, Bourita stressed the close organic links between armed groups and separatist militias on the one hand, and terrorist organizations, cross-border criminal networks and mercenaries on the other, rejecting any notion that any of these entities could be regarded as peaceful or constructive forces capable of taking part in conflict-resolution processes.
Such entities, he said, rely exclusively on violence and faits accomplis in pursuit of hidden agendas.
In response to the threat posed by non-state armed groups, MFA Bourita called for firm international action based on explicitly holding accountable States that sponsor, shelter, finance and arm such groups.
The responsibility of sponsoring States, he said, goes beyond political considerations to entail legal, moral and historical responsibility.
In this regard, he stressed the need to put an end to any attempt to use armed groups as a pretext to evade international responsibility or as a means of implementing, by proxy, the agendas of the States that support them.
The minister also called for deterrent sanctions against such groups and those who protect them, as well as the application of the principle of accountability to any party that finances them, supplies them with weapons or provides them with shelter.
