President Clinton has urged UN members to set up a new international court to prosecute the most serious offenders of human rights. In his address to the General Assembly in New York, he also pledged support to Mrs Mary Robinson in her new role as High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Warning that "trouble in a far corner can become a plague on everyone's house", the President said "people the world over cheered the hopeful developments in Northern Ireland".
Mr Clinton said the US was prepared to pay off an undisclosed amount of its $1.2 billion debt, which is handicapping the UN's ability to carry out its goals, but he asked that the US share of the annual budget be reduced from the present 25 per cent to a "more equitable" level.
Earlier, the UN Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, appealed to debtor nations, of which the US is the largest, to "liquidate your arrears and to pay your future assessments in full, on time and without conditions".
Mr Annan, who broke with tradition by addressing the opening session, asked the 185 member states to make the 52nd session the "reform assembly". He has already proposed a package of reforms, some of which require the agreement of all the UN members, such as expansion of the Security Council and a new assessment system for the budget.
President Clinton said the US "welcomes the secretary general's efforts to strengthen the role of human rights within the UN system and his splendid choice of Mary Robinson as the new High Commissioner". Glancing over at Mrs Robinson in the audience, Mr Clinton said: "We will work hard to make sure she has the support she needs to carry out her mandate."
The President did not go into detail over his surprise proposal to "establish a permanent international court to prosecute the most serious violations of humanitarian law" before the end of the century. He called for continuing support for the present UN war crime tribunals and truth commissions dealing with atrocities in former Yugoslavia.
President Clinton and Mr Annan praised the $1 billion gift announced last week by Mr Ted Turner, founder of CNN, for UN agencies dealing with the poorer countries. Calling him a "truly visionary American", Mr Clinton said his gesture "highlights the potential for partnership between the UN and the private sector" and he hoped that more would "follow his lead".
Mr Annan called Mr Turner's donation "extraordinarily generous and historically unprecedented". He described the gift as the start of a "new and promising relationship" between the UN and the private sector.
President Clinton also announced he was sending the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which he signed last year, to the Senate yesterday for ratification.
Mr Clinton said a priority for him was to work with Congress on a comprehensive plan to "pay off the bulk of our arrears and assure full financing of America's assessment in the years ahead".
He did not refer to the difficulty caused by the fact that the Republican majority is only prepared to pay off $900 million of the estimated $1.2 billion owed by the US. But even this lower amount would depend on the US assessment being reduced from 25 to 20 per cent.
Such a reduction would have to be approved by the UN memberstates themselves. Many are not in a mood to make concessions to the US because of resentment at the way it forced the replacement of the former secretary general, Dr Boutros Boutros-Ghali.