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Round Table: Dialogue among Civilizations United Nations, New York, 5 September 2000 Provisional verbatim transcription

Address by Edouard Shevardnadze (Georgia)

President Shevardnadze (interpretation from Russian): I believe that it is appropriate and even symbolic that we have gathered today to talk about culture, tolerance and a global dialogue as mankind enters an entirely new epoch and during the course of the Millennium Summit. The problems that we are discussing are no less relevant today than they were a thousand years ago. While we can deplore the existing reality we must first recognize it for what it is and work out a contract for our dialogue. In this sense I very much appreciate the efforts of the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Kofi Annan, and the efforts of the initiators and organizers of this meeting, the Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Mr. Koïchiro Matsuura, and His Excellency, President Khatami, who have so precisely captured the essence of the global problem of the dawn of the third millennium.

When scholars predict a clash of civilizations in this very new millennium, an epoch of the internet and the final mapping of the human genome, we are compelled to ask ourselves the question, after several milleniums of human existence can we not avail ourselves of humankind's accumulated experience and make the universal dream of peaceful coexistence and the mutual complementarity of cultures finally come true. Can we not ensure that new technologies serve only the goal of mutual enrichment and not the development of misanthropic theories on the innate inferiority of particular cultures.

History has proven that there are no inferior cultures. A human being by virtue of his ability to think and feel is naturally predisposed to ideals of goodness and justice that are inherent in all religions and civilizations. I represent a small country with the grand traditions of multi-ethnicity, plurality of beliefs, and tolerance and wisdom. Throughout Georgia's multi-century history, my homeland, there has been no epoch when our country's Orthodox Christian culture was not adorned by the presence of others, including the great Islamic culture. The Muslims of Georgia have always felt themselves equal citizens, as did the sons and daughters of Israel. In this sense the notions and traditions which later became the basis of the values of good citizenship and equality were inherent to Georgia which also enriched its national culture with great humanist ideals of Iranian, Turkish, Byzantine, Russian and European civilizations. This is not only a cultural tradition but it is also a State one and is naturally for us a priority.

At the same time, Georgia represents an example not of wars and animosity but of mutual complementarity of cultures that leads not to decline but to a flourishing of national culture. Thanks to, but not in spite of, cultural pluralism our people managed to not only preserve our national identity but to add new colours and shades to our national Georgian ethnic culture. I do not fear conflict in the desire to preserve one's secret inherent national self. We desire to do this with a similar national aspiration to draw on different cultures. In this very fact I see a modern embodiment of the ideal of choice, not as a negation but as a way of enrichment and development.

As the President of Georgia I consider myself to be entitled to suggest to you that the next meeting of the round table be held in Tbilisi. I will be entirely forthright and say that I consider the capital of my homeland to be well placed for organising such an event and even for locating the headquarters of a permanent international structure which would systematize and coordinate our joint efforts. I fully realize that a policy maker speaking about culture, risks crossing over into the political coordinates and logical schemes. Indeed there is a common system of coordinates which we can see and understand only through the unconditional recognition of the primacy of universal human values, giving such notions of political culture and cultural politics some concrete meaning. Thus retaining culture as a constant denominator.

That is precisely what we had in mind when developing the concept of new thinking for the new world. Five years ago at the Tbilisi international forum for a dialogue of cultures, I stated that the policy maker must become a key figure in the dialogue of cultures and that politics itself must become an instrument for interaction between cultures. At the same time the more culturely based politics is, the stronger it will be as a link between cultures. As I said then the past years have strongly reinforced my conviction that we must create world architecture which is in line with the new realities of current geoculture and geopolitics to prevent the devastating manifestations of xenophobia, ethnic cleansing and intolerance and to develop not merely the dialogue of cultures but elaborate a system for the interaction of cultures.

The principle of solidarity against a flagrant lack of cultural regard, hence aggressive separatism and ethnic hatred, must become its basis. I hope that our dialogue will become an important factor in this global process. We not only must, but based on the historical experience and culture of our peoples, can create strong guarantees for a peaceful, happy development in the new millennium which will we hope become an epoch of solidarity between peoples and civilizations.

Mr. Matsuura: I now have the honour to invite His Excellency, Mr. Alpha Oumar Konaré, President of the Republic of Mali to take the floor.

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