Obama, in farewell to UN, calls for global 'course correction'

President Barack Obama on Tuesday called for a "course correction" in the march to an integrated world, saying the gains made in recent decades were threatened by "uncertainty and unease and strife."

Obama, making his valedictory address before the U.N. General Assembly in New York, painted a picture of nations struggling with economic inequality, sectarian conflict and rising nationalism.

"We cannot dismiss these visions," he said. "They are powerful. They reflect dissatisfaction among too many of our citizens."

The president insisted that the remedy for this global uneasiness was not to retreat to old divides.

"The answer cannot be a simple rejection of global integration," Obama said. "We should work together to make sure the benefits of global integration are broadly shared."

He called for a reaffirmation of commitments of collaboration on issues like climate change and nuclear nonproliferation — issues on which, he said, the United States has often taken the lead.

In a sweeping tour of the world, the president confronted the sectarian chaos in the Middle East, Russia's aggression toward its neighbors, and China's disputes with other Asian countries in the South China Sea. He did not articulate any new policies, and in fact reaffirmed his view that some problems resist outside intervention.

On a morning when his secretary of state, John Kerry, was struggling to salvage a fragile agreement with Russia for a cease-fire in Syria, Obama made clear that there were no better options to end the five-year civil war. "In a place like Syria, where there's no military victory to be had," he said, "we're going to have to pursue the hard work of diplomacy."

Obama said that Russia's annexation of Crimea and its destabilization of Ukraine might pay political dividends for President Vladimir Putin, but that Russia's aggression would ultimately weaken its position abroad.

"In a world that left the age of empire behind," Obama said, "we see Russia attempting to recover lost glory through force."

The president did not spare the United States from his catalog of worrisome trends, and he seemed to take aim at the campaign of the Republican nominee seeking to succeed him, Donald Trump.

Obama said the United States and Europe were dealing with a rise of nativism, spurred by fears of mass migration.

"You see people wrestling with concerns about immigration and changing demographics and suggest that people who look different are somehow corrupting the character of our countries," he said.

Twice, Obama referred to the futility of nations' building walls. "A nation ringed by walls would only imprison itself," he said.

Obama's words also illustrated the distance he has traveled from the hopeful young president who first addressed the General Assembly on Sept. 23, 2009. On that day, he pledged to forswear the unilateral approach of his predecessor, George W. Bush, and laid out an ambitious blueprint for a "new era of engagement based on mutual interest and mutual respect."

Its four pillars included ridding the world of nuclear weapons, confronting climate change, forging peace between the Israelis and Palestinians, and tackling the world's growing economic inequality.

Obama claimed progress on two of those fronts, citing the nuclear deal with Iran and the Paris climate accord. But he acknowledged that the other pillars remained unfinished. Israel and the Palestinians are no closer to a two-state solution, and inequality has deepened around the world.

Even Obama's successes are not unalloyed. Iran may be adhering to the terms of its nuclear agreement, but North Korea recently tested a nuclear weapon, defying the United Nations and stymying Obama, who like his predecessors has struggled to curb the government in Pyongyang.

Other goals have been equally elusive. In 2009, Obama promised to close the military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, but 61 prisoners remain and the prospects for shutting it by the time he leaves office are dimming. Obama pledged that he would remove all U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of 2011; several thousand are still there, in advisory roles that put them close to combat against the Islamic State.

Seven years ago, Obama promised to mend fences with those alienated by his predecessor, and foreshadowed the tension he would face as a president who did not reflexively take the lead in every international crisis.

In his speech on Tuesday, he looked back on this and took stock of his diplomatic record.

"The end of the Cold War may have led too many to believe that all problems were either caused by Washington or could be solved by Washington," Obama said. "Perhaps too many in Washington believed that, as well," he added, to laughter.

When he noted that the United States had finally paid off its dues to the United Nations, the chamber exploded in applause.