Theresa May pledges UK commitment after Brexit

NEW YORK

British Prime Minister Theresa May pledged Tuesday that the U.K. would remain committed to its values and partners around the world, despite voting in June to leave the EU.

"When the British people voted to leave the EU, they did not vote to turn inwards or walk away from any of our partners in the world," May said while addressing the UN General Assembly for the first time.

"My pledge to this UN is simple. The U.K. will be a confident, strong and dependable partner internationally, true to the universal values," she said.

May said her country would continue to honor its commitments -- spending a portion of the U.K.'s gross national income on development, reducing poverty, dealing with instability and driving sustainable development goals around the world.

She added that the U.K. would also meet its NATO commitment, spending 2 percent of the country's GDP on defense, and also announced new peacekeeping deployments to Somalia and South Sudan.

With respect to the Paris Climate Change Agreement signed in April, the prime minister said the U.K. would begin domestic procedures to ensure its ratification and complete it before the end of the year.

May also called the UN to action to fight modern slavery.

"Organized crime groups, who are largely behind this modern slavery, lure and force innocent men, women and children into extreme forms of exploitation," she said.

"Victims are held captive under the constant shadow of violence and forced into sex and labor exploitation," she said.

May noted that she is setting up the U.K.'s first-ever government task force for modern slavery, bringing together every relevant department in her country, and using its aid budget to create a dedicated fund to focus on high-risk countries.

"Yesterday, I committed the first 5 million pounds from this fund to work in Nigeria to reduce the vulnerability of potential victims," she said.

May also urged various foreign law enforcement agencies to work together to track down organized crime groups.