BRUSSELS/FRANKFURT/PARIS (dpa-AFX) - The President of the United Nations General Assembly has appealed for Europe to protect the international rules-based system, defend the truth in the face of fake news and other falsehoods, and support UN reform.
In a key address to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France, Annalena Baerbock repeated her call to uphold multilateralism amid 'trying times' globally.
She noted that just 40 days into 2026, the world has already seen crises around Venezuela, Iran and Greenland, on top of continuing devastation in Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan and elsewhere.
'The international order is not only under pressure, it is under attack,' she told lawmakers.
'And we face a new and more troubling kind of crisis: conflicts waged not even under the pretense of self-defense or respect for international law but often carried out in open defiance of it.'
She warned that at precisely the moment the world most needs cooperation and the UN, 'powers - even those who have a special responsibility to protect peace and security - are pulling away from it or even outright attacking it.'
Baerbock recalled that four years ago, when she was Germany's Foreign Minister, she addressed the General Assembly and called for the UN to stand up for Europe's peace as Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
'Today, I'm coming as President of the General Assembly to Europe, calling for Europe to stand up for the United Nations because the world needs the UN. But right now, the UN and its principles as enshrined in the Charter, needs the world too,' she said, referring to all continents.
'It needs you to form a cross-regional alliance to protect, defend and champion the Charter and the international rules-based system that benefits us all individually and collectively.'
She noted that the UN is also 'dealing with an existential liquidity crisis,' with some Member States not paying their assessed contributions - whether late, or not at all, for years.
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