U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday sharply criticized world leaders, he said who are pushing international cooperation toward collapse through blatant violations of international law, while stopping short of naming specific countries.
Guterres, who will step down at the end of 2026, was giving his last annual speech setting out his priorities for the year ahead and said the world was riven with "self-defeating geopolitical divides (and) brazen violations of international law."
He also slammed "wholesale cuts in development and humanitarian aid" – an apparent reference to deep cuts to the budgets of U.N. agencies made by the United States under the Trump administration's "America First" policies.
"These forces and more are shaking the foundations of global cooperation and testing the resilience of multilateralism itself," Guterres told the General Assembly.
"At a time when we need international cooperation the most, we seem to be the least inclined to use it and invest in it. Some seek to put international cooperation on deathwatch."
