The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which is holding 14th Summit in the Cuban capital, is defending a plan of action capable of guiding its efforts to transform the unjust international order. Representatives of more than 100 nations and 23 international organizations and close to 1,000 reporters around the world have converged onto Havana for the event.

With an interval of 27 years, the movement is holding its summit in Cuba for the second time, at which the Cuban government appealed to 115 other non-aligned member countries to bestow the NAM with new goals for development and recast the NAM as an indispensable world force, so as to spur the establishment of a more just and rational new order in international politics and economics.

To date, the new NAM has experienced both glory and low ebbs with its history of 45 years. To encounter grave confrontations between the two blocs headed respectively by the former Soviet Union and the United States, the developing countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America in 1961 started the NAM to pursue their own independent and nonaligned foreign policies and shape the third political force besides the forces of the two poles.

With the cessation of the cold war in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the NAM has gradually landed itself in a low ebb, and some people even held that the movement has lost the value for its existence. As the tide for the globalization sweeping across the world, however, the gravity of each nation has shifted from the political field into its economic sphere, and many economic organizations among the developing nations have sprung up. So, there is a risk for the NAM likely to sink into oblivion.

Under such circumstances, the current summit has been turned into a pivot for its member nations to jointly recast the NAM in response to new challenges. With wide-ranging topics for discussion, the ongoing summit reflects opinions and viewpoints of the developing countries on a couple of major international issues.

The nonaligned developing countries have made clear their positions on such issues as anti-terrorism fight, the Middle East conflicts and the Iranian nuclear enrichment program, which are all different from those of the Western nations. Take the Iranian nuclear program, the summit supports Iran to develop its nuclear energy, and regards the peaceful use of nuclear energy as the basic right of all nations.

On the launch of the war on terror, the summit denounces the US government for its "preemptive attacks" policy and definition of the so-called "evils of axis," and initiated the non-use of force in dealing with international disputes.

Aziz Pahad, South African deputy foreign minister, referred to the current international situation as more complex and dangerous. Major changes have taken place in the world political setup ever since the founding of the NAM, he acknowledged, and the principles of multilateralism it had advocated are of major practical importance when the international political forces are imbalanced with multiplied regional conflicts rising all around the globe today.

Confronted with new challenges and new opportunities, the current summit is actively inspiring cooperation and mutual assistance of the developing countries so as to help advance the NAM movement to a new phase and strive to recast its historical status. What worth mentioning is that leaders of many developing countries at the summit will attend the United Nations General Assembly to be held in New York shortly. The NAM nations account for 60 percent of the UN membership and, therefore, some consensuses reached at the summit will soon find expressions at the UN General Assembly.

By People's Daily Online