United Nations:
Joe Biden delivered a somber farewell speech to the United Nations on Tuesday, using his own decision to withdraw from the US presidential election to warn of the dangers of autocrats around the world who refuse to quit.
“My fellow leaders, let us never forget that some things are more important than staying in power,” Biden said to applause in his final speech at the UN General Assembly in New York.
The 81-year-old urged world leaders to stand up for democracy in the face of rising unrest and conflict, urging support for Ukraine and pushing for peace in the Middle East.
But with six weeks until a vote that could return the isolationist and election-denying Donald Trump to the White House, Biden closed his speech by drawing lessons from his own life.
“This summer I had to decide whether I would pursue a second term as president. It was a difficult decision. Being president has been the honor of my life, there is so much more I want to get done,” Biden said.
“As much as I love the work, I love my country even more. After fifty years of public service, I have decided it is time for a new generation of leaders to move my country forward,” he added.
“It’s your people who matter most.”
HISTORY
Biden dropped out of the race for the White House in July after a disastrous TV debate against Trump fueled concerns about his mental acuity, and he has endorsed his Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee.
Countries around the world are now nervously eyeing the November 5 US election, fearing that a Trump victory would mean a return to his hardline foreign policy.
Biden’s speech marked an effort to burnish his own legacy while urging other world leaders to protect it from being undone by the Republican if he wins.
He said he had seen a “remarkable history” over five decades of public service and that as the world reels from a series of crises, “things can get better, we should never forget that.”
Reflecting on the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 to end his country’s two decades of involvement, Biden said he thought “every day” about the US troops hit by a bomb during the withdrawal killed.
The US president, who often talks about his family’s Irish roots, also returned to many familiar themes from his presidency, quoting Irish poet WB Yeats’s statement about how the “center cannot hold” as he insisted that this might be the case.
Biden even drew laughter from the assembled world leaders when he joked, “I know I look like I’m only 40.”
For all its lofty themes, Biden’s speech offered few details on how to resolve the foreign policy issues that Trump or Harris will face.
CRISIS AND UNCERTAINTY
He warned of a “full war” in Lebanon, without saying how to avoid it, after Israeli attacks on Hezbollah that killed at least 558 people.
Biden’s prized goal of a ceasefire in the Gaza war between Israel and Hamas, meanwhile, seems further away than ever.
On Ukraine, Biden was more emphatic, saying that “Putin’s war has failed” in Ukraine and warning that Kiev’s allies “cannot grow tired” of their support.
He will receive Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky – who was in the UN hall to watch Biden’s speech – at the White House for talks on Thursday.
During his speech, Biden also emphasized the importance of US alliances that he has sought to strengthen after the Trump years – during which the Republican repeatedly questioned long-standing US ties.
Biden held a joint event on tackling fentanyl trafficking with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, met UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and was due to deliver a speech on climate.
Biden’s UN swan song comes amid a broader effort to “Trump-proof” his legacy in his last four months in power.
He himself noted that he “came to the presidency at another moment of crisis and uncertainty,” just days after pro-Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol to try to prevent lawmakers from certifying Biden’s election victory.
Trump continues to falsely claim he won the 2020 US presidential election and has repeatedly refused to say he would accept the outcome if Harris wins this time.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)