G77 - Secretary-General: I Applaud your Group for Pushing Maximum Ambition and Justice for All

I commend Uganda’s stewardship of the G77 and China over the last year. 

And I congratulate Iraq as it assumes the Chairmanship for 2025. 

Iraq was a founding member of the G77 60 years ago. 

And I welcome your focus on accelerating support for developing countries, especially as we approach the deadline for the 2030 Agenda.  

This vision cuts to the heart of your group’s purpose and function. 

As a voice of justice for developing countries. 

As champions of equality, poverty eradication and the Sustainable Development Goals. 

As strong supporters of our reform efforts to advance gender parity, focus on country-level results, and improve the effectiveness of our work. 

As a constant wellspring of ideas to revitalize key UN bodies -- including the committees of the General Assembly and ECOSOC. 

And -- always -- as keepers of the flame of multilateralism. 

We are living through a period of devastating conflicts and violence -- from Gaza to the wider Middle East, to the Sahel to Ukraine and beyond. 

A period of climate disasters that have battered many of your countries with deadly heatwaves, melting glaciers, droughts, rising seas, floods and storms -- while constraining already limited fiscal space and erasing development gains.

A period in which the Sustainable Development Goals -- and the futures of millions of people around the world -- hang in the balance. 

A period defined by a widening digital divide, and technological advancements racing ahead of our ability to govern them for the good of humanity. 

And a period of deep mistrust and divisions that are becoming more and more entrenched. 

It is in your countries where the impacts of these crises are most keenly felt. 

But thanks in great part to your tireless efforts, we saw a new flicker of hope at September’s Summit of the Future. 

The Pact for the Future adopted at the Summit is a sign of a new solidarity among countries. 

Along with the Global Digital Compact and the Declaration on Future Generations, the Pact proves that countries can rally around reform.

These are not just agreements. 

These represent a promise that countries can unite to reshape a multilateral system that serves all people and all countries. 

And they represent a global recognition that -- for too long, in too many ways -- developing countries have been handed a raw deal. 

A raw deal on finance -- in which development is deferred, time and again, by a lack of adequate and affordable finance and grinding cycles of debt service. 

A raw deal on climate support -- with countries denied the resources required to build resilience and avert climate catastrophe they did little to cause.

And a raw deal on representation at key decision-making bodies -- from the global financial architecture, to the governance of groundbreaking technology, to the UN Security Council itself. 

When looking at these challenges, we cannot forget the decades, even centuries, of injustice, violence and coercion inflicted on many of your countries.

The long shadows of colonialism, slavery and unchecked resource extraction continue to loom today.

And the multilateral machinery the world has used since 1945 to build peace, provide finance and govern global relations has proven to be woefully unfit to meet today’s challenges.

It has failed to adequately deliver the level of support your countries need and deserve.

And more fundamentally, it has kept your voice from being fairly heard and heeded at key decision-making tables.

The Pact’s clear commitment to expand representation on the Security Council and to reform the international financial architecture are important examples of global commitments to update our institutions to better reflect, and address, today’s realities. 

I applaud your group of countries -- individually and collectively -- for pushing for maximum ambition and maximum justice for all. 

As this year begins, let’s keep pushing to deliver on the Pact of the Future’s commitments. 

Later this week, I will deliver an address on priorities for the coming year. 

Suffice it to say, 2025 must be a year of keeping promises to developing countries. 

To intensify our efforts to make the Sustainable Development Goals a reality for all people in all places. 

To put an end to poverty and hunger, transform education and create jobs, and provide equitable and affordable access to energy, technology, finance and markets -- essential elements for developing countries to prosper.

And to ensure developing countries can access the financial resources required to fuel development. 

We need Multilateral Development Banks that are bigger, bolder and better, enabling them to massively scale up affordable financing for countries in need. 

We need pre-emptive action to help countries in or near debt distress, so that they can refocus on investing in the SDGs. 

We need a debt resolution architecture that works in a more timely and effective manner for countries in crisis. 

And we need an open, predictable, inclusive multilateral trading system that can help developing countries build links to global value chains, drive prosperity and fight poverty. 

The world must also keep its promises on climate. 

By sparing no effort to keep 1.5 degrees alive through a reduction in global emissions of nine per cent every year to 2030.  

By ensuring a just transition from fossil fuels to renewables. 

 And by putting forward new, economy-wide national climate action plans by COP30 that align with 1.5 degrees. 

 The biggest countries -- the G20 -- must lead.

But all countries need to step up their ambition, in line with the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities. 

Developing countries need a surge of support to adapt and protect your people from deadly climate impacts. 

Developed countries must honour their commitment on climate finance -- including a doubling of adaptation finance to at least $40 billion a year. 

Multilateral Development Banks must ensure concessional finance is deployed where it is most needed, factoring in the structural vulnerabilities you’re facing. 

And it’s high time to address the injustices of the energy transition. 

It’s absurd, for example, that Africa is home to 60 per cent of the world’s best solar resources -- but only two per cent of global investments in solar power. 

And we must ensure that critical mineral resources in developing countries benefit them, first and most, by maximizing their participation in value chains. 

Finally, the world must keep its promises on ensuring effective guardrails for emerging technologies. 

The Global Digital Compact includes the first-ever universal agreement on the governance of Artificial Intelligence that brings every country to the table. 

We must ensure that all countries benefit from AI’s promise and potential to support widespread development and social and economic progress. 

As we look to the big challenges ahead for the year, you can count on me to continue standing with the G77 and China.

Let’s keep fighting for justice. 

Let’s ensure that 2025 is a year in which promises made are promises kept. 

Thank you. 

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