UNITED NATIONS: In his final speech before the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, US President Barack Obama warned the international community that ignoring inequality within and among nations allowed crude ideologies, like religious fundamentalism and aggressive nationalism, to take root.

Obama, who completes his second and final tenure in January, also emphasised the need for a global “course correction” in his departing speech. “Too often, those trumpeting the benefits of globalisation have ignored inequality within and among nations, have ignored the enduring appeal of ethnic and sectarian identities, have left international institutions ill-equipped, underfunded, under-resourced in order to handle transnational challenges,” he said.

“And as these real problems have been neglected, alternative visions of the world have pressed forward, both in the wealthiest countries and in the poorest; religious fundamentalism, the politics of ethnicity or tribe or sect, aggressive nationalism.”

Obama described this form of national as a “crude populism, sometimes from the far left but more often from the far right, which seeks to restore what they believe, was a better, simpler age free of outside contamination.” This was an obvious reference to the “crude populism” of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump who fans a white supremacist ideology to win over support.

For the Pakistani delegation attending the UN General Assembly what President Obama did not say was more significant than what he did. The delegation, which has come to New York to highlight Kashmir issue, was hoping the US leader to say at least something on the Indian atrocities in the occupied valley. But President Obama did not even make a fleeting reference to the Kashmir issue. Instead, he focused on the foreign policies he pursued during his eight years as the leader of the world’s sole superpower and called for global integration as a means for defeating divisive ideologies.

He argued that the world today was safer, more peaceful and prosperous than it has been in the recent past, an argument many would disagree with, include some in his own country who believe that global terrorism was now greater threat than it has ever been.

Just yards away from the UN building, hundreds of troops guarded offices, train stations and other public places to prevent a possible terrorist attack. New York has been on a high security alert since Monday, when police arrested an Afghan-American, Ahmad Rahami, for planting explosives devices at various places in New York and New Jersey. Instead of allaying these fears, Obama talked about the progress made on global issues during his presidency— the response to the 2008 financial crisis, climate change, nuclear non-proliferation and human rights.

He, however, urged world leaders to move “forward and not backward,” forming a global future based on open markets, accountable governments, human rights and international law.

“The answer cannot be a simple rejection of global integration,” Obama said, but rather to make sure “the benefits of that integration are broadly shared. A world in which one per cent of humanity controls as much wealth as the other 99 per cent will never be stable.”

“We cannot unwind integration any more than we can stuff technology back in a box,” he said, arguing that trade wars and “beggar-thy-neighbour” economic policies would make the entire world poorer.

Denouncing religious fundamentalism, he said: “Surely religious traditions can be upheld while teaching children science and math instead of intolerance.”

The US president also acknowledged America’s own mixed record on human rights and democracy, but said that his country also accepted its mistakes and corrected them when it realised the need to do so.

“When Iran agrees to accept constraints on its nuclear programme, that enhances global security and enhances Iran’s ability to work with other nations,” he said. “On the other hand, when North Korea tests a bomb, that endangers all of us … (it) must face consequences.”

Obama also said that weapons with nuclear weapons had a unique responsibility to pursue the path of reducing their stockpiles and reaffirming basic norms like the commitment to never test them again. While promoting global integration, he pointed out that no walls could stop the mosquitoes that spread the Zika virus. “Mosquitoes don’t respect walls,” he said, to chuckles across the General Assembly hall, as delegates from across the globe saw it as a reference to Trump’s Mexican border proposal.

”Sometimes I’m criticised in my own country for expressing a belief in international norms,” he said. “Binding ourselves to international rules, over the long term, enhances our security.”

Published in Dawn, September 21st, 2016