Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's keynote address at the Non-Aligned Movement Coordinating Bureau (NAM-CoB) Ministerial Meeting in Putrajaya today had won praises.

It has been described as opening an avenue for NAM members to reflect on their past achievements and to tackle present and future challenges.

Ministers attending the meeting said Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's speech reflected their respective countries' views and concerns on many international issues such as unilateralism and multilateralism.

"I think it was a great speech... he delivered a very clear speech... all the issues on Palestine, human rights, Iraq, UN reforms and unilateralism," said Senegal's Minister of Trade Mamadou Diop.

"I think the PM gave an open avenue to the NAM (to reflect the past and the future)," he was quoted as saying by Bernama .

In his address, Abdullah, who is also NAM chairperson, said despite being united on broad matters of principles of importance to the movement, NAM member countries sometimes were unable to use their numerical strength to the best advantage.

"This poses a real challenge to the chair of the movement. We could have made a better impact on the reform and restructuring of the United Nations, on the 2005 Millennium Summit outcome and on the Millennium Declaration, but we did less than what we could have done," he said.

Diop said the problems besetting the world today were complex and no country should take unilateral action as it would threaten the world peace and stability.

Solve problems

Somalia's Transitional Federal Government's Minister of Foreign Affairs Abdullahi Sheikh Ismail said that Abdullah's speech was very inspiring and focused on how to solve problems faced by the 114-member movement.

"About unilateralism...there is a lot of concern...we want a world of collective decision based on multilateralism," he said.

Meanwhile, Jamaica's Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Senator Anthony Hylton said that Abdullah delivered a balanced speech touching on many issues confronting NAM and the challenges and opportunities for NAM countries in this 21st century.

He said Jamaica agreed on the importance of multilateralism in dealing with international issues and also the need for all countries to respect international law.

"Unilateralism poses a threat to all of us and undermine democracy and rule of law...it is not the approach to solve problems," he said.

Sierra Leone's Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Dr Mohamed Lamin Kamara described the premier's speech as "very good" which highlighted all main issues of the world and NAM.

He said no single nation should impose its will on others and take unilateral decision and sometimes even "using the United Nations."

"If it happened to Iraq it could happen to Sierra Leone and any other nation. So we are very apprehensive and we feel very concerned with this kind of behaviour. So we think we must be multilateral in our action," he said.