Landmine Convention 10th Anniversary Banquet

Your Royal Highnesses, Ministers, Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,

It gives me immense pleasure, on behalf of the Norwegian Government, to welcome you to this evening. We hope you have had a nice stay in Oslo during these days and a fruitful exchange of experiences, and that you have renewed all the contacts and partnerships that we are so proud of in this process.

In this room today, we are many who have contributed to what happened ten years ago, and to what has happened every week since the Mine Ban Convention was signed and entered into force. I cannot name all of them, but I want to take this opportunity to thank all of you, including those who are not present and whose names are not in the programmes, but who have contributed so much.

I would also like to pay my respects to all the victims, both those who became victims of anti-personnel land mines before this convention saw the light of day and those who have become victims since then.

But let us also think about all those who have not become victims because of what we achieved ten years ago. There are probably many of them, and they should inspire us.

This, in our view, is not a day of celebration, of looking back and being self-congratulatory. This is really an event to sum up the lessons, re-inspire and reunite, and look ahead.

Today, I have met two fabulous women. Two Nobel Laureates – Shirin Ebadi and Jody Williams. And I have learned what Nobel Laureates don’t rest on. And that is their laurels. They are looking ahead, and they are inspiring us all to move forward.

And what is this all about? Well, it is about continuing to address the agenda of human security. What happened ten years ago was only the first real attempt to do that in a different way, and it can only be the beginning of a very long process.

During these two days, we have discussed small arms, we have discussed cluster munitions, and we have even discussed nuclear weapons. And there can be many more issues, many more threats, many more challenges.

My point is that what we are celebrating today is a legal document, but it is also a method. It is also an approach. We spoke about that yesterday: the way governments and civil society found a way of coming together.

I stress strongly that we should not confuse the roles. Governments can never become NGOs and vice versa. NGOs can never become governments.

But we have learned how we in certain settings can work together and become something quite different from what we are in our traditional settings. Many still find this an unfamiliar idea. And many still find it quite alien. But I am convinced that it is the approach we have to take. Not only on the human security issues, which we have defined, but on development issues and so many other global issues that require our attention. Not least, the approach to climate change, which is going to challenge us to work in very, very different ways and in new ways.

Now, as you know, I myself, my Government, my colleagues in Government and throughout civil society in Norway are focused these days on the cluster munitions issue. We have more than 80 states behind us at this stage. We had more than 40 coming to Oslo in February, and as we said: this is a good start.

And the fact that we are more than 80 here today brings me to my last point. When we agreed to adopt the Convention, we were 89. So, we are almost there. Three months later, when it was signed, we were 122. And when Iraq joined the Convention a few months ago, we were 155.

This doesn’t mean that we can simply move ahead with the cluster munitions ban and sign it now. Because we have a year of very hard work ahead of us. But it shows us that it is possible, we will make it, and we will apply the method and inspiration from the land-mine effort, which has taught us so many valuable lessons.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Oslo, I hope you have an excellent evening.

Thank you.