Union of South Africa

First of all, permit me to take this opportunity to associate the South African delegation with the tributes which have been paid from this rostrum to those who were responsible for the planning and the construction of our permanent headquarters, To them, and to those under whose direction and guidance this gigantic task was performed, we owe a debt of gratitude — and I should like to place on record my Government’s recognition of the efficiency with which that task was executed. We now are permanently housed. Our wanderings and temporary arrangements, since 1945, have often had unhappy consequences for our respective exchequers. They could not, also, but have had an unsettling effect on our Organization — and the mere fact that we have now moved into our permanent headquarters may, I believe, enable us to settle down and build solidly on the foundations which were so wisely laid at San Francisco. 62. If there is one thing that characterizes the development of the United Nations during the years since San Francisco, it is the gradual loss of faith by the many millions, the peoples of the United Nations, in the future of the Organization. During the years — the difficult years — since San Francisco, the hope and the faith, which was inspired by our founders, has gradually diminished, until today there is uncertainty — uncertainty on all sides — whether the United Nations can ever fulfil its early promise of creating the conditions and relationships which are essential if the world is to have peace, and mankind is to have that sense of security which is necessary for a full and fruitful life. 63. How could it be otherwise? For how could we expect that faith to continue unimpaired when, we consider the facts which, surround us, when we observe the continuous process of estrangement, so clearly reflected in our debates, the mounting tensions, due not only to major differences but also to the prosecution of minor feuds and rivalries? When we see all this, how can we expect the peoples of the world to continue believing — believing with unshaken faith — that on its present course the United Nations will ever achieve the high purposes for which it was created? 64. And yet, despite these doubts and fears which beset them, the peoples of the world continue to look to the United Nations as their best hope of achieving world peace and security. The Charter, as drafted, at Sari Francisco, contains all the essential elements to permit of the full development of this Organization into an effective means of ensuring international harmony. The Charter contains the essential elements to enable us to become the most effective bulwark of peace and security. 65. It is therefore not so much the Charter which is at fault. It was framed in a spirit of goodwill and co-operation at San Francisco. It established obligations — and included certain safeguards — and the test of the failure or success of our Organization lies in the manner in which we live up to these obligations and respect these safeguards. It is for us, and especially for those who, in consequence of their larger experience, and influence, have been entrusted with leadership, to ensure that we do not stray from that course charted by our founders, in search of other goals which will vitiate our efforts to achieve the primary objective of the Charter, and by so doing lead to certain failure and the inevitable ultimate disintegration of the United Nations. 66. The United Nations was created for the primary purpose of maintaining international peace and security. That system of collective security is the keystone in our Charter, and it is to the development of that system that we must apply ourselves assiduously, at all times eschewing anything and everything which can militate against success in achieving this all-important objective. 67. We can succeed — as indeed we must — if we are to keep faith with those who look to us for peace. This Organization has already given proof of what it can do. It has already shown that it can deal effectively with real threats to the peace. I need but refer to the assistance rendered by it in restoring peace in Greece and in terminating armed conflict in Palestine. I need also but refer to the action taken by the United Nations in repelling aggression in Korea, which is perhaps the best proof we have that this Organization, given the loyal support of its Members and firm leadership by those entrusted with initiative, can still become a real and effective guarantor of peace and security for the future. 68. In order that this may happen however, it is essential that that unity of purpose to which we pledged ourselves originally should be achieved. The present conflict in Korea demonstrates how sadly this unity of purpose is still lacking. Let me say at once that some of our Member States have, of course, been precluded by circumstances peculiar to their own cases from participating actively, and I have no wish to say anything which could be construed as implying criticism of them. But is it not true that there are Member States which have chosen to follow a singularly neutral course, as though the present struggle were one with which they were not directly concerned? In fact, have we not had to witness how some Member States have seen fit to obstruct this great task undertaken by the United Nations in order to fulfil its promise to combat aggression — wherever it might occur? Have we not seen how, in certain cases, they have even seen fit to heap calumny on those who are sacrificing their lives in order that the United Nations may be enabled to give effect to the solemn undertaking explicit in our Charter? 69. No one any longer doubts that had the United Nations refused to act in Korea as it did act, the system of collective security, which is basic in our existence, would have become meaningless and the Organization itself robbed of its main purpose and its real value. 70. I may perhaps explain that it was this consideration which led my Government to decide to make its contribution, a modest contribution in relation to that of certain other Member States, but a contribution as real and as effective as my country’s limited resources would permit. It was because of this consideration that the Union of South Africa decided to participate actively in an area so distant and in which we could have no direct military responsibilities. It is also because of this consideration that the Union of South Africa has assumed extensive military commitments in other parts of the world — I refer, of course, to the Middle East and to Africa. 71. Let me repeat, therefore, that, given, the widest support of its Members, the United Nations can become an effective instrument of collective security and the best means of ensuring world peace. And it is the view of my Government that we should, under present world conditions, direct all our efforts to the attainment of this fundamental objective. If, by dissipating our energies in other, less profitable and sometimes dangerous, directions, we should lose sight of this objective, the United Nation would lose its real purpose and undoubtedly would run the danger of becoming, not the virile and all-important international, organ which it was intended to be, but rather a propaganda forum for the prosecution, in the spotlight of world publicity, of. the relatively unimportant feuds and rivalries to which I have already referred. It is against this danger, this danger of the Organization degenerating into a propaganda forum, that we have to guard. 72. It is essential, therefore, that we seek some early remedy against the present dangerous tendency of dealing in the United Nations with matters which cannot be solved here and which only serve to exacerbate feel jugs and so militate against the achievement of our primary common goal. If international co-operation for the purpose of rendering the world secure against aggression is to remain our objective, this tendency will have to be discouraged. And this we can do. We can do so by refusing to deal in the United Nations with matters which do not fall within the purview of the Organization, We can do so also by limiting, as far as possible, our agenda — which in any case is becoming increasingly unrealistic — to matters on which we can co-operate. This would, in the view of my Government, enable us to accustom ourselves to the idea and practice of working together, and thus to create a climate which would be more conducive to a sober approach to problems on which major differences exist and which require the aggregation of true diplomacy and statesmanship available to this Organization. 73. This is not the first Occasion on which a South African representative has drawn attention to the danger of continuing, year after year, to place On our agenda matters which do not belong there and the discussion of which, apart from being improper, in certain instances, clearly threatens co-operation and healthy relations between Member States. We have done so often enough, for we are not without experience in this matter, having been the victims during every single session of this dangerous practice. Our domestic affairs, or rather a distorted version of them, have time and again been paraded in this Organization in a most improper manner at the instance of people who, by doing so, have not hesitated to sow the seeds of discord when it was their solemn duty under the Charter to seek harmony and co-operation. They have, of course, been aided in their efforts also by those who neglect no opportunity to exploit the problems of others in order to promote their own subversive policies. 74. This year again, South African issues figure largely on the agenda — in our view improperly so. I had not intended to allude to them today, but two days ago we heard a statement in-this debate and from this rostrum in which the domestic affairs of South Africa were discussed in a manner which must have shocked many of those present. In that statement [393rd meeting], the representative of India sought to exploit certain events in the Union of South. Africa events which might never have occurred had it not been for the sustained intervention in our affairs by the Indian Government. In fact, the representative of India went so far as to state in the most, unmistakable terms that those who are deliberately breaking the laws of my Country have tire blessing of her country. This, of course, we have known all along, but to repeat that blessing from this rostrum was a most reckless disregard for the principles of the Charter and the purposes for which the United Nations was founded. 75. May I, in this connexion, refer the General Assembly to one paragraph of the resolution “Peace through deeds” [resolution 380 (V)] which it passed in 1950? That paragraph reads: “The General Assembly… "Solemnly reaffirms that, whatever the weapons used, any aggression, whether committed openly, or by fomenting civil strife in the interest of a foreign Power, or otherwise, is the gravest of all crimes against peace and security throughout the world”. If the delegation of India supported this resolution — as I believe it did — how does India reconcile that solemn affirmation which I have just read with its present action of inciting civil disobedience in my country? 76. In any case, I may perhaps just add that had it not been for the acrimonious discussions of our affairs in this Organization, the Union of South Africa and the other countries concerned might not have drifted so far apart as they are today. 77. And ours are by no means the most serious problems. There are problems with which it is correct for the United Nations to deal, and in fact with which it must deal, which constitute an infinitely greater threat to international co-operation, and in some cases even to world peace. It is with these problems, with these disputes and differences, that the United Nations must deal in order to carry out its primary task of promoting international harmony and of maintaining international peace. All other matters, in so far as Us Organization is concerned, should be subordinated to those problems, and it is to render the atmosphere more conducive to their solution that we should avoid, at all times, the acrimonious discussion here of minor differences which could, in any case, be settled more readily outside the United Nations — even though in certain cases the United Nations is empowered by the Charter to deal with them. 78. It is true, of course, that these major problems to which I have referred are in the main the responsibility primarily of the great Powers, but when they are placed before the United Nations they become our common concern. It is then that the aggregate of wisdom, of diplomacy and of statesmanship in this Organization is invoked in order to seek solutions and settlements, in the absence of which international relations continue to be charged with dangerous tensions. And it is in order that this fundamental task may be rendered less impossible than it would appear to be today that we should guard against unhealthy practices, including the abuse of this rostrum for the purpose of making speeches designed not so much to seek solutions or to bridge differences as to derive benefits of a purely propaganda nature. It would be wrong, I think, to draw the analogy of the United Nations being the town meeting of the world too closely if by that we permit the Organization to be exploited for, purely partisan political ends. 79. When our founders met at San Francisco, they realized that this system, of collective security could not be brought about by mere inscription in the Charter. They realized that, in order to bring it about, it would be necessary to rely upon a great partnership based upon a sincere desire to work together. They knew, however, that such a partnership would comprise many peoples, many races of different cultures and different traditions, and that these differences would continue to exist. They conceived it essential that, in order to enable it to perform its great task, this Organization should be created and should set about its work in such a manner as to reconcile natural differences as far as possible. In the Charter they therefore told us what we should aim at and they also told us what we should avoid and not do. History had shown that the interplay of cultural and other forces had almost invariably been accompanied by clashes of one sort or another. If we were to work together, we should have to respect the differences which were and are peculiar to the different groups, peoples and races which comprise the United Nations, 80. Therefore, in. pursuing our great common goal of bringing peace and security to the world, we should at all times be aware of these things and ensure that these differences do not obtrude themselves on the performance of our common task. 81. I have not sought to make a long speech. I have merely desired to state simply and clearly the dangers inherent in the course upon which this Organization appears to have embarked, and to ask that we return to the Charter which was drafted at San Francisco, as well as to the spirit of mutual good will and cooperation which then existed. I have also desired to suggest that we seek to build on that Charter and in that spirit in order that we may achieve the high purpose for which the United Nations was primarily created.