Sharm el Sheikh - The 15th Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit was wrapped up on Thursday, after member countries reached consensus on promoting solidarity and ratified documents on jointly addressing international and regional issues.
At the two-day summit held in the Egyptian Red Sea coastal city, leaders from over 100 NAM countries focused their debate on the summit's theme of International Solidarity for Peace and Development.
They extensively discussed current hotspot international and regional problems, such as the ongoing global financial crisis, climate change, the Middle East peace process, food security, energy and nuclear issues.
NAM countries have demonstrated again their determination to play a bigger role in the world arena.
They called for closer solidarity among member states to address global threats and challenges and promote world peace and development.
Some NAM member states appealed for the construction of a new international political, economic and trade system, which is more balanced and equitable.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said: "It is abundantly clear that no country - regardless of size or resources - can solve problems alone. That raises the stakes and the space for the Non-Aligned Movement to shape a better world."
The summit admitted Argentina as a NAM observer country and the World Peace Council as its observer organisation, while Egyptian President Hosny Mubarak was elected as Chairperson for the following three years.
The summit also signed the Sharm El Sheikh Declaration and the over 100-page Final Document.
The document expressed NAM's standpoints on a variety of international and regional matters, including disarmament, international security, peacekeeping and peace-building, human rights and democracy, self-determination, issue of Palestinians, UN reforms, the world financial crisis, food security, international terrorism, among others.
The Declaration is regarded to be an outlined edition of the document, charting the course for the Movement in the future three years.
In the Declaration, the leaders reiterate their strong commitment to the purposes and the principles of the UN Charter and international laws.
The leaders are determined to revitalise and reinvigorate NAM's role and influence as the principal political platform representing developing countries in multilateral fora, in particular the UN, the Declaration reads.
They vow to enhance the strengthening and revitalisation progress of the movement through concrete measures, at all levels, and in different multilateral fora, and to maximise the ability of NAM to deal with the current rapidly evolving global situations, crises and challenges, it added.
On peace and security in the continent, the leaders pledged in the Declaration to strengthen solidarity in combating terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, wherever and by whoever committed, in accordance with the principles of the UN Charter, international law and the relevant international conventions.
"Terrorism should not be associated with any religion, nationality, civilisation or ethnic group," the NAM leaders said.
They urged the international community to make more efforts and further progress in formulating a joint organised response to terrorism in all forms, as proposed by the movement's new chairperson, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France in 1986.
They also called for the early finalisation of the draft comprehensive convention on international terrorism, strengthening the application of the UN Global Counter Terrorism Strategy and convening a high level conference under the auspices of the UN.
However, challenges still exist for the movement. Although the NAM groups 118 countries, representing nearly two-thirds of the United Nations' members, and comprises 55 percent of the world population, the total amount of NAM members' gross domestic product (GDP) is still comparatively small.
Moreover, most NAM countries are still ravaged by poverty, including some least developed countries which count on aid and assistance let alone have final say on world issues.
The next summit will be held in Iran in 2012.
