Friday 12 / December / 2025
UNITED NATIONS: Amid shrinking resources, intensifying conflicts and climate shocks, Pakistan has urged the international community to focus on preventing and resolving outstanding disputes, saying peace is not only a moral imperative — it is a humanitarian necessity.
“Unless conflicts are prevented and resolved, appeals will continue to grow and humanitarian response will continue to be overstretched,” Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN, told the General Assembly.
Speaking in a debate on Humanitarian Assistance, he called for harnessing renewed solidarity and strengthened multilateralism to peace in order to address the alarming rise in global humanitarian needs, emphasizing that unresolved conflicts remain the primary driver of humanitarian need.
In this regard, the Pakistani envoy reiterated that humanitarian assistance cannot substitute for political solutions.
“Mechanisms for peaceful settlement of disputes, including preventive diplomacy, mediation, and good offices of the Secretary-General must be strengthened to resolve longstanding conflicts and disputes,” Ambassador Asim Ahmad added.
He highlighted findings from the UN’s 2026 Global Humanitarian Overview, noting that 293 million people will require humanitarian support in 2026, while current resources allow aid to reach only 135 million.
This growing gap, he stressed, is not an abstract deficit but a matter of “lost lives, preventable suffering, and deepening instability.”
Ambassador Asim Ahmad underscored that the humanitarian system is under “unprecedented strain,” driven by entrenched conflicts, record displacement, declining respect for international humanitarian law, increasing aid worker casualties, and escalating climate shocks.
