Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has called for the early adoption of the International Covenant on the Right to Development, emphasizing that every individual deserves the right to seek a better future and that every nation must have the tools to build it.

He was addressing a high-level meeting marking the 40th anniversary of the Declaration on the Right to Development at the United Nations Headquarters today.

The Prime Minister said the declaration had placed humans at the heart of development four decades ago, affirming it as an inalienable right of the people.

He said the declaration's message was profound, as progress must not merely create wealth but must advance social development and uphold human dignity.

The Prime Minister regretted that this promise today confronts a stark reality across the developing world, where shrinking fiscal space and scarce resources are being diverted from human development.

He said climate disasters are erasing hard-earned gains, while technological inequalities threaten to carry old divides into a new digital age. He said that a right cannot be realized where the means to realize it are denied. He called for a proactive approach in this regard.

Highlighting Pakistan's development efforts, the Prime Minister said the country's development pursuits are anchored in a homegrown economic transformation plan built on enhancing exports, embracing digital technologies, taking effective climate action, enhancing energy infrastructure, and ensuring equity and empowerment. He said the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor complemented this agenda.

Beyond national efforts, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif called for addressing debt distress, which he termed a debt trap, besides reforming the international financial architecture to provide concessional finance, deliver climate adaptation and loss and damage support, and bridge the digital and AI divide.

He said Pakistan supported the early adoption of the International Covenant on the Right to Development.

The Prime Minister said that the true measure of development is not how far the world advanced, but whether humanity advanced together in a collective mode.