By Lee Kap-soo

The following is the full-text of the New Year message delivered by UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Dec. 28, 2023. -- Ed.

2023 has been a year of enormous suffering, violence, and climate chaos.  Humanity is in pain. Our planet is in peril. 2023 is the hottest year on record.

People are getting crushed by growing poverty and hunger. Wars are growing in number and ferocity. And trust is in short supply. But pointing fingers and pointing guns lead nowhere.

Humanity is strongest when we stand together. 2024 must be a year for rebuilding trust and restoring hope.  We must come together across divides for shared solutions. 

For climate action. For economic opportunity and a fairer global financial system that delivers for all. Together, we must stand up against the discrimination and hatred that are poisoning relations between countries and communities.

And we must make sure new technologies such as artificial intelligence are a force for good. The United Nations will keep rallying the world for peace, sustainable development and human rights. 

Let’s resolve to make 2024 a year of building trust and hope in all that we can accomplish together. I wish you a happy and peaceful New Year.

Guterres served as secretary-general of the Socialist Party from 1992 to 2002. He was elected prime minister in 1995 and announced his resignation in 2002, after his party was defeated in the 2001 Portuguese local elections. After six years governing without an absolute majority and with a poor economy, the Socialist Party did worse than expected because of losses in Lisbon and Porto, where polls indicated they had a solid lead.

Eduardo Ferro Rodrigues assumed the Socialist Party leadership in January 2002, but Guterres would remain as prime minister until the general election was lost to the Social Democratic Party, led by José Manuel Barroso. Despite this defeat, polling of the Portuguese public in both 2012 and 2014 ranked Guterres the best prime minister of the previous 30 years.

He served as president of the Socialist International from 1999 to 2005, and was the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees from 2005 to 2015. Guterres was elected secretary-general in October 2016, succeeding Ban Ki-moon at the beginning of the following year and becoming the first European to hold this office since Kurt Waldheim in 1981.