Nauru Rebrands as Naoero, Embracing Indigenous Heritage at UN

President David Adeang of Nauru announced at the United Nations General Assembly that his nation is officially changing its name to Naoero. Adeang stated the rebranding aims to reclaim the country's heritage and shed its colonial past, emphasizing that 'Naoero' is the name the indigenous population has always used.

"There are moments in the life of a nation when people are called to remember who they have always been. This is such a moment for us," Adeang declared, explaining that the former name, Nauru, was how the pronunciation sounded to outsiders and how the world knew it. He described the change not as a modification but as an effort to "affirm a truth," a new branding for both the world and its approximately 12,000 inhabitants.

The small Pacific island nation, which gained independence in 1968 after periods of British, New Zealand, Australian, and German colonial rule, has diplomatic ties with Israel and recently inaugurated an embassy in Jerusalem. The official name change, signaled in February, follows a global trend of countries adopting indigenous names to reject colonial legacies, similar to Swaziland becoming Eswatini and Burma becoming Myanmar.

Adeang stressed that the name change honors rather than erases the past, stating, "This name carries the memory of our ancestors, our language, and our identity. It was there all along. It was never lost, it was never absent. Today we bring back Naoero." He concluded his address by urging the world to "say our name."