Joint Press Stakeout: UN Secretary-General and President of the European Council

It's a great pleasure to welcome the Secretary General of United Nations. The United nations is a key institution in the international order. And now in these very troubled moments that we are living more than ever it's decisive to uphold the international rules based order, to support multilateralism and to support United nations action.

I would like to commend especially the determination of the Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, to lead the United nations in such difficult moment. A lot of international actors are challenging the international order. But what we experience is that in fact there is no alternative for the international rules based order because the alternative is chaos. Alternative is the war in Ukraine. The alternative is the war in Middle East.

The alternative is the humanitarian dramatic situation in Gaza. The alternative is wars in several countries in Africa. Then we need to uphold for the international rules bed order to support the multilateral system and to support special United Nations. And I want to ensure that the Secretary General, that the European Union will continue to be the great supporter of your work and the work of the United Nations. Thank you very much to accept our invitation.

Ladies and gentlemen of the press, let me start by two clear messages. First, to the United States and to Israel. It's high time to to end this war that is risking to get completely out of control, causing immense suffering on civilians and with propagation around the global economy that is really dramatic with potential tragic consequences especially for the least developed countries. Second message to Iran. Stop attacking your neighbors.

They were never parties to the conflict. The Security Council has condemned these attacks as ordered them to stop, as it has ordered to open the Strait of Hormuz. The prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz causes enormous pain in so many peoples around the world that have nothing to do with this conflict.

It's time for the force of the law to prevail over the law of the force. It's time for diplomacy to prevail over war. I want naturally to say that I'm extremely grateful for this invitation. The European Union and the United nations have an exemplary cooperation. And the European Union has been a fundamental support for the UN and for multilateralism.

And I hope, I'm sure the European Union will be absolutely central in the efforts to create an international order based on the rule of law. An international order in which we will have more justice, in which we will have more climate action, in which we will have more control of the evolution of technologies and in which international law will prevail. Thank you very much. Thank you. Sorry, do you have any.