Zaire. A doctor of the Order's German Relief Group (MHD), treating a Rwandese child in a refugee camp set up by the Order in cooperation with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

They will especially reflect on the prestige of our institution world-wide, both on the level of its humanitarian work and on its diplomatic projection.

We have already seen in New York that some countries which had not yet opened diplomatic relations with the Order showed their willingness to do so after our success in the United Nations. If we consider that the partners with whom we have full diplomatic relations have risen from 27 to 67 over the past 30 years, it is possible that in the near future their number could rise even more. And let us hope that it will include those powers still conditioned by the nineteenth-century concept that sovereignty is only the prerogative of territorial States.

Rwanda. The flag on one of the Order's relief vehicles follows an interminable column of Rwandese refugees, ready to give support and assistance with doctors and nurses from the ECOM's Relief Groups (Emergency Corps of the Order of Malta), set up four years ago in the sphere of the Strategies Programme.

In the United Nations, Observers do not have a vote but they have a voice. This opens new prospects for the Order's participation in international agreements and social works, especially in the fields most congenial to our humanitarian mission such as protecting the health, freedom and dignity of persons, their civil and social progress, their fight against violence and fostering peaceful international coexistence.

Our active presence will also help to co-ordinate better our real intervention abilities with those of the other members of the United Nations and with its specialised agencies.
Another important consequence of our admission to the United Nations will be the further legitimation we can vaunt with regards to the numerous organisations which are unlawfully trying to usurp our symbols, name and rituals for commercial ends, often betraying the public's goodfaith.

We are aware, in the Grand Magistry just as in the Order's peripheral organisations, of the additional endeavour required of us to honour the recognition obtained from the international community.

All the dignitaries and operators must double their efforts in order not to disappoint expectations on the commitment of the Knights of St. John in New York and in the world.

Luciano Koch
Secretary for Foreign Affairs of SMOM

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