The Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, has told the opening session of the 78th UN General Assembly in New York, that the world is becoming "unhinged" and seems incapable of coming together to respond to global challenges.
He said we were living through a time of "maximum danger and minimum agreement" and that instead of ending the scourge of war, "we are seeing a surge of conflicts".
He said UN member states create a world of insecurity for everyone when they break the pledges they made when they signed the UN Charter.
"Exhibit A: Russia's invasion of Ukraine," he told delegates.
The Secretary-General also addressed global inequalities. The devastation caused by the floods in Derna, Libya, was a result of years of conflict, climate chaos and "leaders - near and far - who failed to find a way to peace".
"Even now, as we speak, bodies are washing ashore from the same Mediterranean Sea where billionaires sunbathe on their super yachts," he said.
"Derna is a sad snapshot of the state of our world - the flood of inequity, of injustice, of inability to confront the challenges in our midst," he told the General Assembly.
Mr Guterres also spoke about women's rights, which, he said, were being rolled back around the globe.
"Just four women signed our founding document," Mr Guterres said, referring to the UN Charter.
"One look around this room shows not enough has changed.
"'We, the Peoples' does not mean 'we, the men'," he said.
"Women are still waiting for equal opportunities and equal pay, for equality under the law; for their work to be valued and their opinions to count.
"In some countries, women and girls are punished for wearing too many clothes; in others, for wearing too few," he told delegates.
Mr Guterres warned that the global system was facing a "great fracture" in economic and financial systems and trade relations. He said divides between North and South and East and West were deepening.
"We confront a host of existential threats - from the climate crisis to disruptive technologies - and we do so at a time of chaotic transition," he told the General Assembly.
