Vuk Jeremić took office at the UN

"Nearly 800 years after the Magna Carta Libertatum, many people around the world still do not enjoy some of the fundamental rights mentioned in that document: rights that protect individuals while allowing sovereign states to develop independently in peace and security.

It is for this reason that I believe that strict respect for international law and support for the construction of legal states should be one of the most important topics at the 67th session of the UN General Assembly," said Jeremić.

By working together even more closely, we will send a clear message to those who finance, plan and participate in terrorism that history is not on their side

"Peace and security are prerequisites for the stability necessary for global economic growth, sustainable development and social progress," said Jeremić.

The new chairman of the UN Assembly, who took over from his predecessor from Qatar late last night on behalf of the Eastern European Group consisting of 23 countries, added that the priorities will be a more active process of disarmament, the fight against terrorism and the strengthening of UN peacekeeping missions.

"By cooperating even more closely, we will send a clear message to those who finance, plan and participate in terrorism that history is not on their side. We must never bow down to them," said the chairman of the General Assembly.

Additionally, open the Assembly to institutes and international academic centers

Jeremić proposed that the UN General Assembly be the moral and political guarantor of respect for the peace agreements reached by the conflicting parties, expressing his intention to cooperate with non-governmental organizations in performing his duties, as well as his predecessors, but also to additionally open the Assembly to institutes and international academic centers. He pointed out that he is convinced that the UN, despite all its weaknesses, is "the key address for solving the growing challenges of humanity", promising to serve the goals of the world organization and respect the equality of all sovereign member states.

"The high intensity of changes in the modern world will continue to be a feature of our time... No matter how much we want to, the UN is not able to solve all the problems of the modern world overnight.

Nevertheless, despite all the weaknesses that exist in everything that the human mind has devised, I am convinced that the UN is the key address for solving the growing challenges facing humanity," said Jeremić, who will chair the UN General Assembly in the next year. He pointed out that "it is difficult to imagine a world in which it is possible to achieve peace, progress and dignity without the UN."

Quoting the Nobel laureate Ivo Andrić who said that "he is not afraid of people, but of the inhuman in them", Jeremic pointed out that "controlling the inhuman in people" has always been a key challenge for every just legislator.

The former head of Serbian diplomacy in two consecutive mandates, reminded that such thinking is also at the foundation of the UN Charter, "whose main goal is to prevent resorting to war in dealings between states and resolving disputes between them".