PART I. UN80 General Assembly High-Level Week 2025

“The only way forward is together.”

António Guterres, Secretary General of the United Nations

For the first part of the United Nations General Assembly High-Level Week’s coverage here on MUNute Brief, the annual weeklong event kicked off last Monday, September 22, 2025 at the UN Headquarters, marking significant events, such as the United Nations’ 80th founding anniversary and the halfway point through the Decade of Action. As the UN reaches another milestone, it also faces its biggest challenge yet, with its principles violated and international law disregarded.

With this, Baerbock, President of the UNGA, and Guterres, current Secretary-General, reaffirm the organization’s call for peace, and urge the member-states to recall how the UN came to be, what it stands for, and what kind of future its founders envisioned.

What is the GA High-level Week?

The UNGA High-Level Week is a weeklong event, typically held yearly in the UN Headquarters in September. As a High-Level meeting, the heads of state of the 193 member-states all meet. Here, debates, conferences, and other side events are held to discuss critical issues. 

This year’s event celebrated the 80th anniversary of the United Nations, under the theme “Better together: 80 years and more for peace, development and human rights.” In particular, the event aimed to “reinvigorate” global cooperation and highlight the urgency of the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. 

2025 marks a critical juncture for the SDGs: It marks the mid-point of the Decade of Action, the 80th anniversary of the United Nations, and 30 years since the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. This event was high-level, but open to various stakeholders (such as civil society representatives and the youth), many of which had a chance to participate in the panel events.

The High-level Commemoration was held on 22 September 2025. At the event, the current President of the UNGA, Annalena Baerbock (Germany), recalled the origins of the United Nations. She spoke on how the United Nations was borne of the scourge of the two World Wars and “the unspeakable horrors of the Holocaust”. 

Echoing the theme, she says, “We cannot take the easy path and simply give up. We have to choose the right path; to show the world that we can be better together.”

António Guterres, the current Secretary-General of the United Nations, reaffirms the need for peace. “Peace is the most courageous, the most practical, the most necessary pursuit of all,” he says. However, he also acknowledges the issues beleaguering the UN. “Yet, at this moment, the principles of the UN are under assault as never before,” he says. He speaks of the blatant disregard of some member-states towards international law, citing Gaza, Ukraine, and Sudan to name a few. Furthermore, he speaks in French to encourage those listening: “To meet these challenges, let us remember what our founders knew: the only way forward is together.”

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