Delegate: Adam Axelsson (25 years)
3. Mr. Axelsson (Sweden), representing his country’s youth and speaking under agenda item 94, welcomed his Government’s decision to allow Sweden’s 100 youth organizations to elect a representative. It must be acknowledged that young men and women were a resource for development rather than a target group for aid. Their creativity, engagement and critical thinking made them a vital and unlimited resource for sustainable development and the Millennium Development Goals. But beyond that, the time had come to start looking at things in a new way and to act and think locally as well as globally.
4. He urged all nations to give the youth of the world a voice by sending a national youth representative to the United Nations General Assembly in 2005. That would mean that nations with more means must help the more disadvantaged nations so that all the regions of the world were duly represented. It also meant that non-governmental organizations should be involved in the election of those representatives. The year 2005 was particularly important since nations had undertaken in 1995 to implement the World Programme of Action for Youth to the Year 2000 and Beyond and the decision had been taken in 2003 to discuss and evaluate its implementation two years later. He therefore called upon all States to fulfil their commitments and to carry out that evaluation in all seriousness.
5. The youth of Sweden also called on all nations to implement — locally, nationally and globally — policies consistent with four basic facts: that the youth of the world were not a problematic group of children, but a tremendous resource for development; that they had been acting locally for centuries and by so doing had made a difference; that the time had come to allow them to take a more active part in shaping the future of the world, and that there could be no such thing as good governance without youth participation. In conclusion, he stressed that the question was not whether the youth of the world could and would act locally as well as globally, but whether the nations of the world were willing to tap into that enormous resource.
UN Doc.: A/C.3/59/SR.5
Cite as:
UN Doc.: A/C.3/59/SR.5, 6 October 2004, p. 2, Youth Delegate Search: https://youthdelegatesearch.org/sweden-2004/, doi: 10.17176/20221018-194946-0.