38. Mr. President, allow me first to extend through you to His Excellency Mr. Emilio Arenales my most sincere wishes for his speedy recovery and early return to preside over our deliberations. I wish also to extend, through you, Sir, my delegation’s heartfelt congratulations to Mr. Arenales for the honour and trust which our Assembly deservedly bestowed upon him by electing him to its Presidency. In his person I congratulate his friendly country, Guatemala, and the whole Latin American group.
39. On this occasion may I extend greetings to His Excellency Mr. Corneliu Manescu, the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of Romania, who presided over the General Assembly’s twenty-second session with mastery, integrity and great wisdom.
40. And it gives me great pleasure to mention here with deep respect and admiration our Secretary-General, U Thant, whose efforts and dedication are a source of hope and inspiration.
41. The people of the Yemen Arab Republic, which put an end to the outmoded and oppressive rule of the imamate theocracy and established the Republic by its 1962 revolution, has since been engaged in a long and fierce war, a war forced upon it by reactionary and counter-revolutionary forces in collaboration with international imperialism and its huge oil monopolies. The enemies of human progress have subjected our revolution to savage attacks, our Republic to wide international conspiracies, and our very capital to a long siege. All efforts of these interventions were doomed to failure. Our revolution triumphed, our Republic lives and our people go on with faith and determination towards a better life.
42. We in Yemen feel proud and look to the future with great optimism due to the success which we were able to achieve in the last six years since the revolution, particularly in the economic field. National income has increased, agricultural production has doubled, and in some crops, as cotton for instance, production has more than tripled. Important industries have been introduced for the first time into Yemen with the aim of giving our country the greatest amount of self-sufficiency. Some industrial projects, such as textiles, phosphorus, cigarettes and mineral water industries, are already in the stage of production. Also, for the first time, modern banking and financing methods have been adopted. The Yemen Bank for Reconstruction and Development has played a great role in introducing new avenues of co-operation between the public and the private sectors in industry and trade. Great attention has been directed towards agriculture. Several important projects of reclamation, irrigation and model plantation are in the stage of execution in co-operation with friendly countries, and one project in co-operation with the United Nations.
43. Big strides have also been made in the field of education. Hundreds of modern schools were opened, teachers and instructors were brought to the country, and thousands of young Yemenis were sent abroad for higher and vocational education. Scores of hospitals and medical centres with modern equipment and efficient doctors and medical personnel are now in operation. Clean water and electricity and public services and facilities are provided. Roads were built and the reconstruction plan of the country is going on at a reasonable if not yet satisfactory pace. But most important of all, the Yemenis are living today under their constitution and laws and enjoying full freedom and human rights of which they were deprived under the rule of the reactionary and outmoded imamate. This in our opinion is the greatest and most important achievement of our people, resulting directly from the establishment of the Republic. These achievements have been made despite the fact that ours is a war economy, where the bulk of the national income goes for defence. Our people have to build with one hand and defend their country, their Republic and their revolutionary gains with the other.
44. Despite the withdrawal, about a year ago, of the United Arab Republic forces whose presence in Yemen was taken by some reactionary Powers as a pretext for intervention in our internal affairs, the interventionists never gave up their interventions and dreams. Nay, intervention has become more virulent and more open. Money and arms for the purpose of sabotage, destruction and corruption have been flowing into our country in an unprecedented manner. Even foreign mercenaries are being brought and sent into Yemen in blind, ruthless and hopeless attempts to destroy the Yemeni revolution, the Yemen Republic and the Yemeni people. It is superfluous to state that these hostile and senseless acts are in contravention of the principles of the United Nations Charter and the convention of the League of Arab States, and run counter to the age-old, honoured and respected basis principles of good neighbourliness.
45. We had expected the United Nations to help our people in their striving for peace and security and to prevent external intervention in our internal affairs, as well as to give assistance in the task of reconstruction and development. It pains me to have to mention here that in this connexion the role of the international Organization has been minimal and is at present almost non-existent.
46. We have spared no effort, missed no opportunity, and hesitated at no time in our endeavours to express to all concerned our true and sincere desire to live in peace with our brethren and neighbours, particularly after the withdrawal of the United Arab Republic forces whose presence in Yemen was used as a pretext to send money, arms and mercenaries to our country to fight our people. My Government has issued numerous pronouncements, documents and official declarations reiterating the Yemeni stand. They all call for peace and respect for the will of the Yemeni people, who exercised their right to self-determination on 26 September 1962. But all our efforts and pleas for peace seem to fall on deaf ears. We have yet to see any indication of the presence of goodwill. The war is being imposed upon our people from outside their borders with the purpose of hindering their revolution and their progress. But our revolution has no designs against anyone. The aim of the Yemeni revolution and the Yemeni Republic is to take the Yemeni people out of the era of backwardness and stagnation to progressive and fruitful life.
47. In the present state of the world, the problems and aspirations of small Powers seem to hinge on what agreement or disagreement there is among big Powers. Even their internal security, their independence and their very survival depend on whether external Powers choose to leave them alone, to help or to intervene. This is an unhappy and unhealthy state of affairs with which the people of Yemen are very much concerned. The United Nations could have played a more important role in helping man achieve a better world order. But here again the policies, actions and narrow self-interests of certain Powers have proved to be the important players on the stage. A case in point is the tragedy of Palestine.
48. In 1948 Britain withdrew from Palestine. Instead of returning the land to its lawful people in accordance with the Mandate, Britain was planning a different fate for that unhappy land even before the infamous Balfour Declaration of 1917. The land and its people were delivered into the hands of criminal bands who had gathered from far away lands, armed and prepared under the auspices, protection and blessing of British imperialism. Under the pressure and arm-twisting of the United States this General Assembly, whose membership was then less than half of what it is today, agreed to the partition of Palestine between its people and the transplanted foreigners. The people of Palestine refused to give up their homeland. The Arab nations overthrew the Governments which failed to protect Palestine.
49. Twenty years passed during which this General Assembly and the Security Council issued innumerable resolutions, none of which was implemented by the transplanted foreigners who established a State in usurped Palestine and called it Israel. In the period between the adoption of the partition resolution [181 (II)] and the Security Council’s resolution of November last [242 (1967)], Israel has occupied the whole of Palestine and considerable parts of neighbouring Arab States.
50. In this session, the Israeli Foreign Minister stands on this rostrum to dictate a solution which will legitimize the usurpation of Palestine. Eban goes even further than that to demand open borders between Israel and the Arab States for the infiltration of international monopolies and exploitation for which Israel was created to serve as a base and spearhead in the Arab East. What deepens the sense of tragedy is the regrettable fact that this Organization, its halls and lobbies and this big city with its gigantic mass media are in one world, while the Palestinian people, their rights, their pleas and justice itself are in another. But this cannot prevent us from putting before this House the clear truth, the only truth the people of Palestine — and with them the Arabs and hundreds of millions of justice-loving people around the globe — hold to. Transplanted foreign bands, armed, financed and supported by big Powers, cannot forever impose themselves upon any people on earth who refuse submission to the intruders, no matter how weak and limited the resistance may be at present.
51. In 1948 the Jews left Yemen. The Zionist propaganda led them to believe that they were “returning” to Palestine. All historical facts, however, insist that neither the Jews of Yemen nor their forefathers lived in or even knew Palestine. They were pure Yemenis who adopted Judaism. No doubt other Jewish bands who invaded Palestine from other lands are as foreign to Palestine as the Yemeni Jews. This Organization would be embarking on the awesome and unbelievable task of dividing the world into Christian, Islamic, Taoist States and so on and so forth, to the end of the list of world religions, were the United Nations to give itself the right to legitimize the usurpation of Palestine by foreign colonists in the name of Judaism.
52. According to the United Nations Charter, Palestine should have been returned to its indigenous people at the end of the British Mandate. The Palestinians — Christians, Jews and Muslims — according to the principle of self-determination were to have their own representative government. No moral, no law, no principle could ever justify the take-over of the country by one group, to the complete exclusion of others, and by force of arms, money and support from foreign Powers, the expelling of the lawful people of the land and their replacement by the usurping group’s co-religionists gathered from the four corners of the earth. That goes further than any policy of colonialism or apartheid has ever gone and is more dangerous. That may happen in a period of human moral laxity. It could never last. Gone is the era of the extermination of the Red Indians. Palestine was stolen once before. Palestine is in the heart of the world surrounded by a hundred million throbbing Arab hearts and with them hundreds of millions of freedom and justice-loving peoples around the world. Justice will one day be restored.
53. A few weeks ago the United States of America, a permanent member of the Security Council, announced that it would enter into negotiations to sell Israel fifty Phantom Jet aircraft, at a time when Israel still occupies territories of three Member States of this Organization in utter disregard of every United Nations resolution. Such aggressive behaviour on the part of the United States Government can only be regarded as contrary to the principles of the United Nations Charter and further encouragement of Israel’s arrogance, aggressiveness and expansionist dreams.
54. It is matter of irony that while celebrating the International Year for Human Rights some people still insist on ignoring this glaring fact of our time and still continue to subject to slavery and oppression other peoples which today or tomorrow will ultimately regain their independence. My people — who resisted and fought imperialism on the borders of their country for a long time — stand with all the peoples that are still struggling for their right to self-determination. We look with deep respect and great hope to the freedom-fighters in the Portuguese colonies, in Rhodesia, in South Africa and in Namibia; and we expect the United Nations to redouble its efforts to eradicate the remnants of colonialism and racialism in all their forms.
55. At this juncture the delegation of the Yemen Arab Republic wishes to welcome Swaziland to membership of this Organization and to extend heartfelt congratulations to the people of Swaziland on their independence and their deliverance from the shackles of colonialism. On this occasion the role of this Organization and particularly the Special Committee of twenty-four nations and the Fourth Committee of the General Assembly should be mentioned with satisfaction for the success they have achieved in the implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples [resolution 1514 (XV)].
56. The heroic people of Viet-Nam have been subjected to the misery of unjust wars for long years. The voices of the peoples around the world have been deafeningly clear, vehement and insistent, demanding that the United States put an end to this horrifying human butchery. The bombing of Viet-Nam must stop immediately and unconditionally; and foreign troops must leave that country to its own people. The people of Viet-Nam are the masters of their own destiny. The lot of today’s interventionists and intruders in Viet-Nam will not be better than the lot of their predecessors in Dien Bien Phu.
57. It is unjust and unjustifiable that the People’s Republic of China — with a population of over 700 million — should remain outside the United Nations. The universality of this Organization can never be complete unless the People’s Republic of China occupies its rightful place in this hall and in all the organs of the United Nations as every great Power does. We believe that ignoring this fact is a great weakness of this Organization and indeed degrading.
58. Before I conclude, allow me to allude to the United Nations role in the economic, educational and social fields, which is receiving more attention and recognition and in which there has been encouraging progress. I do have here, however, two remarks to make. Firstly, a considerable portion of the funds allotted for development in those fields is being spent on fantastic amounts of paperwork, too much travel, too many briefings, debriefings and so on and so forth, so that only a small portion of those funds trickles down to real projects. This, I submit, is not in keeping with the spirit of austerity and belt-tightening advocated and inaugurated in this Organization and in the “third world”. The complaint of lack of sufficient funds is understandable. The lack of sufficient funds should, however, impel us to use what is already available in a manner that is most beneficial to developing countries.
59. Secondly, allow me to note also that the United Nations assistance more often goes to those countries that know how to get it than to those countries that really are in desperate need of it. This is a paradox where the “know-how-to-get-it” seems to be the key. The preparedness, the efficient administration, the knowledge of what goes on inside the United Nations and the capability of follow-up make it easier for some countries to get what they want. Less efficient and less sophisticated administration in some other countries, together with lack of knowledge of what goes on, let alone follow-up, in the labyrinth of the United Nations and its autonomous organs, makes it almost impossible for such unfortunate countries to get anything. I hope that these remarks will be given the serious consideration they deserve and that such a state of affairs will be remedied. The balance sheet of the first United Nations Development Decade shows a good many shortcomings. Let us hope that these very shortcomings will help us to do better in the second decade.