113. I take this opportunity to extend to the President the sincere felicitations of the Burmese people and of the Burmese delegation on the occasion of her election to the high office which she now adorns with such grace and dignity. Peace has always been associated with the gentler sex, and we think that Mrs. Pandit’s election to the Presidency of this august Assembly is a happy omen of the advent of peace, a peace that is real and a peace that is not uneasy. We fervently pray that her occupancy of the presidential chair will coincide with a definite change for the better in international relations, a change that is so desperately needed.
114. We also extend our good wishes to the new Secretary-General on his assumption of office. We wish him success in the discharge of his onerous duties.
115. Any survey of the events of the past year would obviously be incomplete without at least a passing reference to the historic events in Korea, and I make no apology for turning to this subject even though every speaker before me has also dealt with it.
116. The Korean armistice is an overdue answer to the prayers of a weary world longing for peace. It represents a turning point not only in the affairs of the Far East, but also in the affairs of the world. We rejoice at the termination of the bloodshed, and we have sufficient faith in human nature to express the belief that, even though a unified and independent Korea may still be some distance ahead of us, the fighting will not be resumed.
117. If we have learned any lesson from the history of Korea over the last four years, it is that any attempt to unite Korea by force of arms is doomed to failure. At best it will result in a vast unified Korean graveyard, while the other possibilities are just to terrible to contemplate. Consequently we would regard any move by any of the parties to resume the conflict, or to provoke, the other side, as an unforgivable crime against mankind.
118. The Korean armistice is inevitably linked with the question of a political settlement. It goes without saying that we share the universal desire to see a unified and independent Korea come into being as soon as possible. But, after all that has occurred in Korea, the fusion of the two parts is bound to be a slow and difficult process, and would be even if Korean interests alone were involved, which unhappily is not-' the case. Consequently the world, and in particular the Korean people, must be patient.
119. We have seen in recent weeks the difficulties which stand in the way even of convening a conference to discuss the Korean issue. It is easy to be disheartened by this, but when we reflect that the armistice itself was a negotiated armistice, and that it took two years of patient negotiation to bring it about, it would perhaps be naive to expect that everything else would fall neatly into place once the armistice had been signed. We are confident that a conference will come into being; but when it does, we must expect that progress will not be as rapid as we all would like to see. This may call for a degree of patience as high as that displayed by the two sets of negotiators at Panmunjom, and we must all be prepared for it.
120. Consequently we must deplore any attempt arbitrarily to limit the duration of the conference in advance. The stakes are too high, not only for the Korean people, but for mankind in general, for any of us to indulge in that kind of luxury.
121. These are the thoughts which occur to us as we look into the future of Korea. My delegation would be the first to admit that there is nothing novel or original in them, but nevertheless we feel that no harm, and perhaps just a little good, may come out of our restating them before the Assembly.
122. The representatives of the United Kingdom and Yugoslavia have referred [443th meeting] to a matter which is of more than topical interest to us. At the appropriate time and place I shall elaborate and describe in detail the position prevailing in Burma in regard to the continued presence of 12,000 unwanted people, whom the United Nations with its delicacy of feeling describes as “foreign” troops, even if we all know who they are. I would merely recall that by a unanimous decision of the General Assembly [resolution 707 (VII)] their presence was condemned; they were asked to leave the territory of Burma and governments were enjoined to help in effecting their withdrawal.
123. Despite such efforts, these people have evinced no desire to go, nor has a single one left Burma. The people in Formosa who' were initially responsible for their entry into Burma and who still continue to help and maintain these troops, supplying them with money and arms, have done nothing beyond giving lip-service towards withdrawing these men. I have stated on a previous occasion that the presence of these troops and their wanton acts, ranging from the looting of rice to their identification with the local insurgents who are fighting the Burmese Government, constitute “aggression” by whatever standard the term is defined. And when such aggression is engineered by those who have been permitted to hold on to a seat in the United Nations, and when they get away with it, we begin to ask ourselves if we are living in the Wonderland of Alice.
124. I should like to impress upon representatives the seriousness of the situation. There seems to be a feeling that some solution by persuasion might emerge. We are not optimistic, but if our friends still think there is a chance of a solution, we only hope that they are right. We must state, however, that the only solution that would give us relief is the total withdrawal of those troops. The specious excuse that General Li Mi has no control over some of his men is not acceptable to us.
125. The complacency with which some representatives view the situation has alarmed us greatly, and such complacency is odd when compared with the excitement that was caused when certain developments occurred in the neighbouring Kingdom of Laos some months ago. One would have thought then that the sky was on fire. Even if one did not quite know if the Kingdom of Laos was in fact threatened, there was no lack of volunteers willing to resort to extreme measures to put out the fire, for it was thought that this alleged fire was inspired by a people with a political ideology different from that of the majority of the Member States. But when the Assembly is faced with a situation such as the one that prevails in my country, where a Member State commits aggression upon another Member State, the tendency is to avoid hurting people’s feelings and merely to hope for the best. Delicacy of feeling comes into play, and a spade is not then called a spade but is termed something even less apt than an agricultural implement.
126. For us, direct contact and relationship with the comity of nations is a privilege only recently acquired, and if in the initial stages of such contact we find the relationship bewildering, we dread to think what the future has in store for us.
127. There are many other matters that we find bewildering, and one of them is the position of the peoples still under colonial rule. In the Charter of the United Nations we have affirmed our faith, if such affirmation is necessary, in fundamental human rights, in the equality of the rights of men and women, and of nations large and small. Despite this affirmation, there are still millions of peoples who groan and suffer under colonial and imperial rule. If they manifest in their desire to shed the shackles that deny them freedom, the reaction of the paramount Power is violent. If they resort to a rising as a last and desperate course, then the world is informed that the movement is communist-inspired. When they do not resort to such violence, but seek redress in this Assembly, then they are told that the matter is one of domestic jurisdiction. It would seem that, despite the high-sounding affirmations and the pious hopes expressed in the Charter, the Assembly itself may become the means of perpetuating colonial and imperial rule.
128. The representative of Guatemala has said [442th meeting] that the colonial epoch is over, and with great respect we endorse his view. The theory of the white man’s burden is an outworn myth. But if there should be people who are yet unfit to rule themselves, it is about time that they were taken away from the not-too-gentle hands of colonial Powers and placed under United Nations trusteeship.
129. I turn now to a problem which is as old as the problem of colonial imperialism itself, and equally outmoded. This is the issue of racial discrimination, particularly racial discrimination based on colour.
130. Of all the assertions which man may make, the assertion that those belonging to one race or racial grouping are in some way superior to those of another race or racial groping, merely because they happen to have a skin of a different colour, is possibly the most audacious. This audacity is condoned when those who make the assertion are themselves comparatively recent settlers in lands where their darker-skinned brethren have dwelt for centuries. The last fifty years have witnessed very great progress in the gradual elimination of this problem in most parts of the world, but we are saddened by the fact that it has required two world wars to bring this about.
131. We wish that we could speak of this problem as though it were a thing of the past, but unfortunately we cannot. We know all too well that it still exists in large areas of the world, and that in at least one country racial discrimination and segregation form basic features of the law of the land, a law which attempts to perpetuate the domination of the darker- skinned majority by a white minority.
132. To the great credit of the United Nations, it was decided last year [resolution 616 A (VII)] to investigate this problem. Particular credit must go to those Member States with predominantly white populations which supported such an investigation. Unfortunately, the government concerned has refused to co-operate with the United Nations, claiming that this is a matter which falls essentially within its domestic jurisdiction, despite the fact that its actions represent a flagrant violation of Article 55 of the Charter.
133. These actions are being watched with increasing resentment throughout' the whole of Asia and Africa, and they have in them the seeds of a dangerous racial conflict which may spread to other parts of the world. If the United Nations is to maintain its prestige and authority in these two continents, it cannot afford to let the clear will of the majority be flouted on this issue by the government concerned.
134. Last year, my delegation drew attention to the widening gap between the living standards of the highly developed areas and those of the under-developed areas of the world. We are grateful to the Secretary- General for devoting a substantial part of his current annual report [A/2404] to this frightening aspect of the world’s development. This problem, we suggest, is serious enough to be considered as something apart from the other problems which plague the world at the present time.
135. It would avail us nothing if the world were to find itself rid of the present tensions at the end of, say, five years, only to find itself confronted with a new crisis with potentialities for evil as great as those of the current world situation. We know that the under-developed areas of the world cannot be developed in five years, but we do suggest that it is important to utilize these years to build up among the peoples of the under-developed areas the prospect of a better life, if not for -themselves, at least for their children; for life without hope of any kind can only result in the release of destructive forces which, once released, might easily make the present turbulent phase in the history of the world appear, by comparison, a spell of paradise.
136. We have tried to set out in general terms our feelings on what we consider to be the most important problems which face the world today. With possibly one exception, namely, the aggression in my country, none of these problems can be solved in the course of this session. But we are confident that, given the will to co-operate, under the wise leadership of our President, substantial progress can be made towards their solution. For its part, the delegation of Burma pledges its best endeavours and fullest co-operation.