Following is UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ address to the opening of the seventy-eighth session of the General Assembly, in New York today:
Just nine days ago, many of the world’s challenges coalesced in an awful hellscape. Thousands of people in Derna, Libya, lost their lives in epic, unprecedented flooding. They were victims many times over — victims of years of conflict, victims of climate chaos, victims of leaders, near and far, who failed to find a way to peace.