PRESIDENT SCIACCHITANO:  Thank you very much again, Mr. Secretary of State, for your visit.  We wish to welcome you very much.  And I will go over to you for any address you want to do the press.

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Thank you so much, Mr. President.  Thank you, colleagues, and I’m going to apologize to my colleagues here because I may be repeating some things that I had a chance to share with them.  But what I shared with them is the commitment of the United States to ICAO, the support for ICAO, the conviction that the work of ICAO could not be more important.

We talk a lot about a rules-based international order.  You hear me talk about that all the time.  This is one of the most powerful examples of what that actually means and means in people’s lives.  To make sure that people can fly safely, that they can do so securely, that they can do so in a way that also makes sure that we’re protecting our environment and sustaining our planet – that is exactly the work of ICAO.

And under the leadership of the president, the secretary general, ICAO is making a very real difference.  We’ve seen this organization take important steps in upholding its own rules and its own principles that go back 50-plus years.  We’ve seen it take very significant strides in setting goals for the entire world when it comes to making sure that aviation can proceed in a way that’s environmentally sustainable, including with the goal of net zero emissions by 2050.  And we see it in the work that it’s doing every single day to make sure that people, products, goods can continue to move about our planet in safe and secure ways.

And in this moment as well, the work that ICAO is doing to help the aviation industry fully retake flight after COVID could not be more vital, could not be more important.  So, it was important for me to come here today, while in Montreal, simply to say how much the United States appreciates, supports, and believes in the work that ICAO is doing.  Thank you.

Thank you again, Mr. President.  (Applause.)