43. Mr. President. I should like in the first place to offer to you the warm congratulations of my delegation and of myself upon your election to the high office of the presidency of the General Assembly. Your election is significant in many respects. It is naturally significant for you yourself; it is significant for your country; and it is also significant for your continent, Africa. I trust that your outstanding personal qualifications and talents will contribute to the success of our deliberations.
44. After much hesitation, the nineteenth session of the General Assembly has falteringly convened, some two months later than its regular meeting date. We had accepted this long delay in the hope that time might help smooth out the present difficulty, and we now come to this Assembly, as never before, with heavy hearts and knowing that something is not well with our Organization. In fact, it is facing one of the most critical moments of its existence.
45. Contrary to our hope and expectation, the passage of time has failed to produce any apparent result. The problem is still here with us. The prospect of a generally acceptable solution remains uncertain. We may no doubt derive some satisfaction from the fact that, thanks to the persistent efforts of the Secretary-General and many others, this session could begin its work in an apparent calm, and that the expected showdown has* for the time being, been averted, or, more exactly, has taken an unusually silent form. Delicate negotiations will no doubt have to be further pursued before we may feel assured that our patient, the United Nations, is well out of danger.
46. The problem this time is not a heightened international tension, a world crisis, or an outbreak of armed conflict. It is simply a banal financial problem, the question of an organization not having enough money to meet its expenditures ’because some of its members refuse to face up to their obligations on the ground that some of the expenses incurred by the organization did not meet with their approval. Had we had to deal with an ordinary organization, no difficulty would have arisen, and the matter would have been disposed of in a normal, legal way. However, since this happens to be an international organization, whose members are sovereign States, the difficulty has assumed unnecessarily inflated proportions, and threatened, by its acuteness, to have extensive ramifications with serious bearing on the future international situation.
47. This is indeed an unprecedented situation, which the unfamiliarized public may find hard to understand. Ordinarily, the outside world has been accustomed to being told that an international organization such as ours was being confronted with political problems of the highest order which, if unresolved, might cause it to founder. But the dilemma we presently find ourselves in deals only with the question of money to finance the Organization. How then could we explain to the millions of people in the world who have placed their hopes and their expectations in the United Nations that, although pressing international problems await our discussion and solution, this world Organization has to lay them aside pending success in resolving our financial difficulty?
48. in saying this, I can assure the General Assembly that there is no lack of realization on our part that, while the difficulty appears to be of a merely financial nature, it involves, nevertheless, many legal and political aspects. However, if all Members keep in mind the welfare and the effective functioning of this Organization, they should, in the first place, have prevented this problem from reaching the present acute stage and, in any event, should not allow it to paralyse or cripple the entire Organization. Although the United Nations has suffered as a consequence of these developments, it is not too late to remedy the situation. A simple but generous gesture on the part of a few Members, without prejudice to their individual positions, could save the Organization from serious trouble.
49. It is therefore our earnest hope that, with this objective in mind and with the necessary reservations in regard to their nations' stand, those Members may make voluntary grants or contributions to the United Nations to avoid the relevant Charter provisions from coming into play. By so doing, more time will be gained for further study and discussion of the problem in regard to the past, the present, and the future, as well. Appropriate organs of the United Nations may be entrusted with this task, if need be, new ones created. Once this problem has been taken care of, the General Assembly will be able to proceed forthwith with its other urgent business.
50. My delegation ventures to hope that this course will be promptly adopted — an action which will show our deep sense of responsibility and will enhance the prestige of our Organization. If through intransigence, or lack of understanding and co-operation, all efforts to reach an agreed solution should fail, my delegation will have no alternative but to support the application of the Charter provisions, for an exception in this instance can only have the most serious consequences for the future of our Organization.
51. While the financial question has captured our immediate attention, the problems facing our international and individual life — the problem of our peace and the problem of our well-being — have lost neither their urgency nor their significance.
52. Last year, when we met in this hall, our hopes were raised higher than at any time since the end of the Second World War, when we learned that more than 100 nations had signed the nuclear test-ban treaty. We were gratified to believe that even that partial agreement might perhaps pave the way towards a saner approach to the problem of disarmament and that, step by step, the spread of dreadful weapons of mass destruction might be curbed. We also thought that even those who already had those weapons in their possession might, in the foreseeable future, see their way clear to agreeing among themselves not to increase their production and not to resort to their use, thus lessening the chances of a catastrophic conflict which might result in the annihilation of mankind and human civilization.
53. But these hopes have now been gravely affected. One nation, and then another, which refused to sign the treaty, continue to disregard the conscience of an overwhelming majority of civilized nations of the world and pursue undisturbed the fulfilment of their objective: the forging of a powerful instrument to serve their national policy.
54. The question thus arises whether such disregard for the well-high universal will of the nations of the world represents so grave a setback to the endeavour to preserve this planet from Contamination and nuclear devastation as to endanger future international peace. As is evident, the question is not merely theoretical, but of a pressing practical nature. Indeed, if certain nations can remain outside the purview of the nuclear test-ban treaty and continue to conduct their own nuclear tests, in spite of the prohibition stipulated by the treaty, that international document may eventually lose its value.
55. Even if the treaty still retains some significance, reasons of national security may compel a number of signatories to withdraw from their existing obligations and undertake their own nuclear development programmes so as to protect themselves from possible external threats, thereby reducing the scope and effectiveness of the agreement. K such a trend towards dissolution were to take place, the treaty would be so stultified as ultimately to become meaningless. Whatever may be the final result, one may safely say that the nuclear tests carried out since the conclusion of the treaty have rendered further enlargement of its scope and application difficult. If not impossible.
56. This downward trend would be arrested only if the non-signatory nations could be brought to accept the treaty obligations and share the almost universal aims and objectives of avoiding the dissemination of nuclear arms and ultimately of prohibiting, under effective inspection and control, the production and use of such arms. Only thus can the efforts toward effective disarmament be strengthened and promoted. Only thus can the world feel safe from the destruction which may be brought by men upon- their fellow men. There can be no objective more worthwhile, and such an objective can be attained only if this Organization, leaning heavily upon the nuclear Powers, addresses itself in all earnestness to the problem of our age. Upon its success will depend the future welfare of mankind. The lack of it may portend a gloomy prospect for world peace and civilization.
57. What has been said relates mainly to the problem of global peace, in which each and every nation undoubtedly has a deep interest. But by and large there exist many other problems of regional peace which may be more limited in scope and extent, but none the less affect many of our nations even more closely and directly. In fact, we have to live with them day and night, and have to devote every ounce of our energy and attention, for they have to do with our personal and national freedom, with our future as free men and women, as well as that of coming generations.
58. These problems owe their existence and acuteness to the fact that some people are not satisfied merely with being able to choose their own economic and political systems, but are also intent on Imposing them upon others. They also want to extend their boundaries, expand their power and influence and, finally, to subject other peoples to their control and domination. In the process, they do not shun the use of force. More often, they prefer to resort to the whole gamut of political and psychological measures, ranging from vicious propaganda, infiltration, and subversion, to insurgency. Euphemistically, they call this campaign "a war of national liberation". In fact, it is a forcible attempt to take away the freedom and Independence of peoples and nations and to lead them to the inferno of subjection and bondage. Those who are now the targets of these nefarious machinations, realizing the stake involved, refuse to believe the deleterious propaganda and false promises. Instead, they resist with all the means at their disposal and, in many cases, have to take up arms to defend their freedom.
59. This is what has been taking place in my part of the world, where too many have to live a life full of threats and dangers, to be terrorized or to die, because they resist attempts to enslave them. That is why the peoples of South Viet-Nam and Laos are staging the fight of their lives, so that they can live in freedom and independence. That is why I hope that in thi6 Assembly, where small nations form a majority and where words about peace, harmony and freedom are uttered freely, the yearnings of these gallant peoples to be able to choose their own destiny un-harassed, will be heard and supported.
60. This desire to be free in the pursuit of one's happiness and to determine the course of one's life is by no means confined to Asia. It also exists elsewhere — In Africa or in Europe, where the German people, like many others want and deserve to have the right to decide their own destiny. For us who have long enjoyed the blessings of freedom, as well as those who have recently been ushered into independence, there can hardly be a more worthwhile cause to uphold than that of lending our firm support to the freedom of others, for in so doing we shall be strengthening our own freedom and helping to remove the seeds of conflict in many areas of the world.
61. Unlike the problems of global scope, those relating to regional peace are well within the limits and capability of smaller nations to contribute to. Success in resolving them will help to strengthen general peace. It is therefore our hope that the United Nations, which counts so many such nations, will devote more attention and consideration to questions of regional peace, which touch them so closely and have an important bearing upon their well-being.
62. Thailand for its part has consistently striven to do its share in maintaining peace, stability and harmony in our part of the world. We have, in the first place, assiduously cultivated good understanding and fruitful relationship with our neighbours, as well as with those who are farther away, and have, in great measure, succeeded. When some of our neighbours become embroiled In difficulties or disputes, we try discreetly — when we are asked — to render whatever services are required of us. Our desire, of course, is to see all obstacles in the way of normal and peaceful relations removed. Where it has not yet been possible to bring about positive results, our efforts aim at preventing differences from developing into larger conflict, for the worsening of an international situation is likely to have widespread repercussions,
63. Notwithstanding the exercise of great care and caution, my country—to our great regret—finds it difficult to have a satisfactory relationship with one neighbour, which has so far refused to live on friendly terms with it and twice on unjustifiable grounds took the initiative of breaking relations with us. In spite of these and other provocations and harassments, Thailand has shown restraint and done all It could not to let this unhealthy state of affairs affect the already unsettled conditions prevailing in the area. The Thai Government appealed to the United Nations to send a mission, which performed a useful role, and for which I should like to express our appreciation.
64. However, if the Secretary-General's personal representative, Mr. Nils Gussing of Sweden, and his colleagues could not do more and did not fully succeed in reaching their ultimate objective, namely, to normalize the relations between Thailand and Cambodia, it was not for want of determined efforts on their part or of co-operation from Thailand, but rather because of Cambodia's unresponsiveness and inconsistency. Agreements which had been laboriously negotiated by Mr. Gussing and could have produced the most salutary effects came to nought because of Cambodia's failure to observe them.
65. A patent example of such stillborn agreements was the non-implementation of the 1960 New York agreement on the cessation of Press and radio attacks, which the Cambodian Government was reported to be willing again to observe. Within a few days after the Thai Government had signified its readiness to agree, as it had done in the past, the Cambodian leaders again failed to honour their obligations and renewed their violent and unjustified attacks against my country, which have continued unabated until the present moment.
66. They claimed, among other things, that their country was threatened by Thailand. However, they were never able to substantiate the charges. Neither could they explain why, if such threats did exist, the Gussing mission, the numerous international organizations with their regional seats in Thailand, as well as the countless foreign observers and the foreign Press stationed in my country, had not detected them or given any indication thereof. The truth is that such accusations were fabricated in order to mislead the uninformed public with a view to scoring unworthy gains.
67. The Thai nation, for its part, has observed with concern and apprehension certain moves and actions of its neighbour to the east which, by its connexion and connivance with certain aggressive forces, are endangering the peace, security and freedom of South-East Asia, If the Thai people and Government continue to maintain a calm attitude and to show forbearance, it is because of their desire not to add further uncertainty to the already delicate and unsatisfactory situation in the region.
68. Important as the issues of peace and security may be, the problems of economic and social wellbeing and that of development, because of their magnitude and complexity, represent a major challenge if order and progress are to be ensured in the world. While sustained efforts have been exerted to eliminate hazards to peace and security and to establish an international community under the rule of law, insufficient attention has been devoted to correct the chaotic conditions now prevailing in the world economy, which is dominated by a few highly developed countries, while the rest of the world has to subsist under the most unfavourable conditions.
69. As time goes by, the gap between this small group and the multitude of suffering undeveloped nations continues to widen at an alarming pace. The more they toil, the more they produce, the less they seem to receive in return for their labour and, according to reliable estimates, the trade gap alone may reach the staggering figure of some $20 billion within a few years. This is because the terms of trade have been highly unfavourable to the developing countries, due to the declining prices for the primary products and other commodities exported by them and the rising prices of imported manufactured goods which are indispensable to their development.
70. As a result of this unfortunate situation, the efforts towards economic development in a great many countries have been slowed down, if not completely blocked. In addition, they have to suffer from the instability of international markets for their primary products, from the practice of government subsidies to production and trade in products in competition with their own, and from restrictive conditions imposed by developed countries on access to their markets of primary commodities, as well as on semi-manufactured and manufactured goods.
71. These grave ills, which grip the economy of so many countries in the world and have brought so much hardship to countless millions of people, have existed and been well known for a long time. However, no serious attempts have been made to cure them, still less to eradicate them on a joint international basis.
72. Only last spring was a beginning made by the convening of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development at Geneva which was hailed, and rightly, by the Secretary-General in the introduction to his annual report, as an "event of historic importance" [A/580l/Add.l, p. 3], Even though it could not be expected that the conference would bring forth conclusive results, the three-month meeting succeeded in setting forth the important issues as well as relevant recommendations. My delegation wishes to express its grateful appreciation to the Secretary- General of the conference, Mr. Prebisch of Argentina, for his most efficient organization and constructive handling of the conference. It is now the duty of this Assembly to give to the report of the conference its thorough attention and consideration.
73. The United Nations, in its nineteenth year, is witnessing a constant and satisfactory growth. Only a few days ago we had the pleasure of admitting three new worthy Members, Malawi, Malta and Zambia, to which I should like to extend our heartfelt congratulations and warm welcome. We hope that the increase in number will be accompanied by an increase in the strength and effectiveness of the Organization in dealing with the numerous weighty problems with which the world is beset, and that, together, the 1X5 Members of this Organization can face the momentous tasks with redoubled energy and wisdom. All our nations are united here, not in misery and starvation, but for the peace, prosperity and progress of our respective peoples.