President Lula will give the opening speech of the General Assembly for the 8th time this Tuesday (September 19th)
The president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) is in New York (United States), where the 78th General Assembly of the UN (United Nations) is being held from September 19th to 26th. This Tuesday (19th September), the PT member will give the opening speech of the event for the 8th time.
It’s a tradition. Since 1955, Brazilians have been responsible for the first speech among the heads of state in the assembly. They are followed by the President of the United States, who is always the host of the meeting.
There is no consensus or formal record of why Brazil begins the general UN debate. The most accepted theory is that it was a tribute to the lawyer and politician Oswaldo Aranha (1894-1960).
The diplomat presided over the 1st Special Session of the UN Assembly, in 1947. At that meeting, he gave important support to the organization’s decision to Partition Palestine, which led to the creation of the State of Israel.
At the time, the newly created UN was supposed to devise a strategy to divide, between Arabs and Jews, the Palestinian territory, which had been largely affected by the Second World War.
The creation of Israel depended on 2/3 of favorable votes from the countries present at the assembly. Aranha’s political articulation regarding the vote of Latin American countries that would like to get closer to Brazil would have been decisive in ensuring that the vote was not postponed and that the minimum number of votes was reached.
Aranha was considered a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize for his action.
However, another accepted theory for Brazilian “privilege” is that, in the first sessions of the assembly, Brazil volunteered to speak first and the tradition continued in this way.
From then on, the traditional order of speeches is:
- UN Secretary General;
- representative of Brazil;
- representative of the United States;
- other countries, organized based on criteria such as the hierarchy of the representative’s position.
This report was produced by journalism intern Gabriela Boechat under the supervision of assistant editor Gabriel Máximo.
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