 May we invite the newly elected head of government, the Prime Minister of St. Lucia, the Honorable Philip J. Pierre. Excellency, the President of Suriname, esteemed heads, Secretary-General of the United Nations, ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. I bring you greetings from the government and people of St. Lucia. I speak to you today as one of the newly elected heads of government, grateful and honoured for the opportunity to address this important body at such a critical time in our collective history. Colleagues, Madam Secretary-General, I am sure you will all agree that there has been no other moment in our post-independence history under whose cloudy skies we are currently seeking shelter, which has challenged our collective existence. We are now experiencing the full brunt of runway price increases for basic items such as fuel, flour and bread, compounded by supply chain issues. The Russian-Ukrainian War has left the entire world reeling from rising inflation, making life for most households very difficult, more so for the people of our region. I recently had to convene a special meeting of my cabinet to discuss the price of bread in St. Lucia. This is how serious and attentive these times have demanded. At this time, Madam Secretary-General, we are still reeling from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, which brought with it business closures, loss of productivity, reduced tourism arrivals and the reduction in government revenues. The demands on our public health system, which we shouldered, to keep our people safe and the provision of social protection and support measures for vulnerable citizens, have left governments of the region with very lack of fiscal space to move ahead, to grow their respective economies. And all of this has followed from at least two decades of external shocks from the slow downs and security costs from the September 11, 2009 terrorist attack on New York City and the global wars which followed these attacks to the impact of the 2008 global financial crisis stemming from the subprime mortgage crisis in the U.S. Mr. Chairman, in between these economic and geopolitical man-made crises, we have had to confront the natural annual cycles of cyclones and hurricanes, a feature of our environment which in recent years have been more ferocious, destructive and erratic. In my recent address to the Summit of the Americas, I made the point that while the world only has of the major weather events because of international television coverage, there are persistent small events brought about by an average rainfall that cause significant damage, often manifested in landslides and flooding and in the process impose additional severe strain on our islands already limited financial capability. Sadly, Mr. Chairman, these destructive weather events are the results of climate change for which we are not the offenders. So fellow heads, given all these realities, you will appreciate that the euphoria of an election victory vanishes very quickly upon occupying the seat of the prime minister. Because the challenges that we face as leaders, especially the new ones, upon sober reflection are very apparent and in the wood daunting. Mr. Chairman, notwithstanding these dangerous winds, St. Lucia's faith in curriculum remains strong and unshaken. St. Lucia continues to believe in the potential strength and protective shelter that curriculum can provide. I witnessed first hand the collective strength of curriculum during the recent negotiations at the Summit of the Americas earlier this month. I want to assure you that I come to the prime minister of St. Lucia in the firm and a binding belief in curriculum. Mr. Chairman, my regional philosophy has been shaped by the small population and size of the country that I lead. But I stand here to affirm that St. Lucia will always be less than it can be without curriculum. Whenever we are faced by external challenges, not of our own making, I'm always guided by the words of the late prime minister of Barbados, ONAFA, that we should face it and fix it. I'm also guided by the warning of our respected colleague and distinguished prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadiers, that we shall avoid the reflective learned helplessness, which arguably stems from our inherited colonial consciousness. So, colleagues, I intend to use the responsibility that the people of St. Lucia have placed on my shoulder to engage constructively with you and the curriculum secretariat and to join your collective experiences to advance the cause of curriculum. In this regard, I pledge to engage energetically within curriculum. We have already signaled our intention to be fully aligned to the Caribbean Court of Justice as the final appellant court in both civil and criminal matters. In this regard, the Governor of St. Lucia has written to the Privy Council expressing this desire. At home, we have formed a committee led by respected journalists to continue the education of our people on this important issue. We must not allow our enforced circumstances of day-to-day survival to dull our memories of the reasons why our past leaders pursued the establishment of the curriculum's single-marketing economy and why they saw it as the most optimum answer to the question of what is the next stage of Caribbean developments. In light of all the global changes that have taken place in the decades since the initial treaty which established curriculum, at the center of the thinking behind the CSME was the need to create the conditions for the free movement of people and capital and the need to establish a single economy as a unified space for joint growth and development for Caribbean businesses and more importantly for the improvement of the quality of life of Caribbean citizens. It should also be recalled that at the center of the CSME was a recognition that the issues of governance in terms of the functioning of the curriculum secretariat had to be reworked to facilitate the implementation of decisions and the day-to-day management of the CSME. Colleagues, it is fair to see that other than the energies which have gone to the pursuit of the single economy at the OECS level and the establishment of the Caribbean Court of Justice at the wider curriculum level, we have not seen the kind of advances towards the CSME within curriculum as we had hoped. As we continue to face the new and emerging challenges of food shortages, the rising costs of basic foodstuffs, climate change, youth unemployment, gun violence and crime and other social challenges, I urge that we reframe our responses within the framework of the CSME. I also urge that you encourage a thorough inventory of the work of the various CSME working groups so that we can reassess where we are and what is to be done to move the regional economic and political unification process forward. Alongside these assessments, SELUSHA pledges to work within the OECS to advance the invocation process within the subregion. Colleagues, colleague heads, SELUSHA believes that without concrete technical action in response to the challenges that we face, we'll see a deepening of the crisis and we'll have no one but ourselves to blame for not devising the appropriate responses. We have complained for too long about the need for special and differential treatment given our vulnerabilities as since. We have demanded too often that our graduation into middle income status should not be used as a basis for denying us to concessionary financing reserves for the world's poorest and most highly indebted countries. We have met our voices heard loudly and clearly on the need for our climate vulnerabilities to be included in the global commitments to the financing for climate change adaptation and recovery. For all these reasons, SELUSHA is pleased and fully supportive of the efforts by the Caribbean Development Bank to develop a new economic model as a means of measuring national income, the resilience, duration, adjuster. We are fully cognizant of the need for such new tools to allow us to access the development finance and debt forgiveness since most of our debt have been the accumulated result of factors beyond our control like climate change, wars, global financial crises and global pandemics. We urge and encourage our regional technocrats, CARICOM included, not only to develop these new tools but to undertake the necessary negotiations to convince the international financial institutions of the need to adopt these new measurements in the evaluation of the economies of CARICOM states. Our regional technocrats and intellectuals must continue to re-evaluate and refine the models being used to assess our economic and social progress and should be repaired to spend more time in gaining greater insights into the nature of the region's challenges and the development of models that are better able to assist us in advancing our countries economically and socially. This region has the intellectual where of all to devise new and innovative models and strategies for our economic development. Colleagues, there can be no meaningful integration without free movement of people and so we must move swiftly to create a lasting reliable and affordable regional transportation infrastructure. We have allowed our discussions on Caribbean sea and air transport to be guided too much by external market forces rather than by the transportation needs of the people and the businesses of our region. In doing so, we have not only closed our air and sea spaces for business expansion and growth for our local investors but we have also surrendered the future of our unification projects to the whims of service providers whose only interest is profit. To put it directly, colleagues, CARICOM needs LIATS or CARICOM needs a better version of LIATS. Unless one of our island-owned carriers emerges as a truly regional carrier not only in terms of countries covered but with a philosophical commitment to making regionalism work for CARICOM citizens then our regional aspirations will continue to be an elusive dream. In this regard, I wish to commend our Montigan colleague, Prime Minister Gaston Brown, for his efforts in keeping LIATS alive. Sen Lusia therefore stands willing to work with CARICOM to find solutions to our regional transportation challenges and will assist in any effort designed to finding the lasting reliable and sustainable airline or consortium of airlines to service the region. Sen Lusia will also be interested in a ferry offering scenic and comfortable service to utilize the potential of our sea routes as an additional traction and transportation option for visitors and citizens alike. Sen Lusia is committed to any effort by CARICOM to find a willing aviation investor to offer dedicated airline services between Africa and the Caribbean. Colleagues, there can be no CARICOM future if the young people of our region continue to wallow in despair, dash expectations, and with crime and gun violence as their most available option. In Sen Lusia, I've made the development of a youth economy one of my most important pillars for my developmental plan for the country. I say this not only as an economic imperative but a moral one. Sen Lusia, we are determined to create a special space for youth entrepreneurship and business growth within the general economic system. In that space, they'll be provided with state resources to help them convert hobbies into entrepreneurship and skills into business for finance and marketing support, training, and mentorship. That's creating sustainable livelihoods and a new cadre of indigenous business people. A dedicated agency that is agile, flexible, and responsive is being created to drive this policy. I stand ready to work with CARICOM to see how we can organically link our development of the youth economy within the existing CSME and then economic and social development mechanisms within CARICOM. Colleagues, our integration will remain continually weakened if we allow the basic principles which has defined our relations to the outside world to be compromised by the foreign policies of other countries. CARICOM is strongest when it holds steadfast to the traditional principles of the right to self-determination of our countries, non-interference in the internal affairs of sovereign nations, the safeguarding of the Caribbean region as a zone of peace, and the pursuit of South-South cooperation. Senutia declares its readiness to defend and uphold the principles which are in conformity with the freedom and dignity of the Caribbean people. Respect for the internal sovereignty of our neighbors and the pursuit of a foreign policy framework that allows it to tap into the developmental potential from regional friends while avoiding making enemies with our long-standing global allies. Senutia believes that a free, sovereign, and economically stable Cuba, Venezuela, and Haiti can only mean a free, sovereign, and economically stable CARICOM. Colleagues, when I was elected as Prime Minister of Senutia, I came in on a promise to be transparent, to be a listener, to be democratic, and to practice as much as possible the principles of sovereign leadership. I have pledged to be guided by the principles of humility, transparency, accountability, inclusiveness, and fairness all, and to put the development of people above everything else. I pledge to use my best efforts to eradicate corruption at all levels. Colleagues, as it is for my domestic political life in Senutia, so I believe it should be for CARICOM. As we strengthen our democracies, 40 to 60 years after independence, let us all commit ourselves to the principles of good governance, constitutional reform, transparency, and accountability, and let us strive to make this region the freest, most democratic, and best-governed part of the universe, all in the interests of the people of the region we have been called to serve. My expectations and dreams as a new Prime Minister in CARICOM are for the attainment of genuine togetherness and integration of our foreign and economic policies. My dream is for a flexible and agile CARICOM, serving the day-to-day needs of our people, and enhancing the faith in our collective destiny. My dream is for a CARICOM that never forgets that the only reason why we have committed ourselves to public life is to serve the people, and so we must put the people first in all that we do. I would like to close with some borrowed words of wisdom. They are the words of 1987 Nobel winner for peace, Oscar Sanchez of Costa Rica, and I quote, Hope is the strongest driving force for people. Hope which brings about change, which produces new realities, is what opens man's road to freedom. My friends, let us be honest and acknowledge that CARICOM's image throughout our region needs to improve. That must change and change now. Too much time has already been lost. We must begin that vital change by being the change the people have for a very long time been crying for. We must not only talk unity, we must demonstrate to our people that we are together confronted by similar problems that can be resolved only by a united CARICOM. I thank you. Thank you, Prime Minister of St. Lucia, Honorable Philip J. Pierre.