In his first address to the United Nations General Assembly, President Biden said the United States will look forward instead of “continuing to fight the wars of the past.”
Biden said the world is at “an inflection point in history.”
“Instead of continuing to fight the wars of the past, we are fixing our eyes on devoting our resources into the challenges that hold the keys to our collective future. Ending this pandemic, addressing the climate crisis, managing the shifts in global power dynamics, shaping the rules of the world on vital issues like trade, cyber and emerging technologies, and facing the threat of terrorism as it stands today,” Biden said to global leaders.
“We’ve ended 20 years of conflict in Afghanistan, and as we close this period of relentless war, we’re opening a new era of relentless diplomacy, of using the power of our development aid to invest in new ways of lifting people up around the world, of renewing and defending democracy, of proving that no matter how challenging or how complex the problems we’re going to face, government by and for the people is still the best way to deliver for all of our people,” Biden said.
The last US troops left Afghanistan at the end of August.
The President said the focus will turn to the Indo-Pacific region, and he pledged to work with allies and the UN.
“And as the United States turns our focus to the priorities and the regions of the world like the Indo-Pacific that are most consequential today and tomorrow, we’ll do so with our allies and partners through cooperation and multilateral institutions like the United Nations to amplify our collective strength and speed, our progress for dealing with these global challenges,” he said.