42. Madam President, twenty-four
years ago your delegation to the first session of the General
Assembly was one of four from the continent of Africa.
Today that number has increased ninefold. In electing you
to preside over the Assembly this year we acknowledge not
only your personal contribution to the United Nations, but
also the distinguished services of your delegation.
43. I should also like to join with those who have
preceded me in this debate in paying tribute to our
distinguished President of last year, Mr. Arenales. We
remember him as a statesman who served his country and
the United Nations faithfully and well.
44. As the United Nations approaches its twenty-fifth
anniversary it is faced with three imperatives: first, to avoid
the scourge of global war and to contain and settle more
limited conflicts; second, to speed the way to economic and
social justice for the hundreds of millions of people who are
now deprived of both; and third, to come to grips with the
serious institutional problems facing the Organization at
this time. This morning I shall have something to say on
each of these matters as they appear to the Canadian
Government.
45. Of these imperatives the first two — the prevention of
war and the struggle to raise the standard of living — are
perhaps as old as mankind itself. The third — to strengthen
and renew this Organization — is new, and is peculiar to this
time and this place. I choose, however, to deal with this
question first, since Canada believes that the United
Nations must fail to reach its goals if it cannot come to
grips with its own problems, It is hard indeed to build
something of value, something that will stand, if your tools
are blunted and ill-designed for your purpose.
46. In addressing myself to this question, I should like it
to be absolutely clear that the criticisms I have to make and
the remedies I will suggest come from an active and loyal
member of the family of nations represented here. Canada
has shown its confidence in this Organization by its
wholehearted participation in all aspects of the work of the
United Nations. We could not conceive of a world in which
the United Nations did not have a central and vital role to
play.
47. The institutional problems facing this Organization are
difficult in themselves. They are compounded by the fact
that, because of their intractability, there is something like
a tacit conspiracy, in which we have all joined, to pretend
they do not exist. The situation might be compared to the
cumulative effect of pollution in a lake or the action of the
sea on the foundations of Venice; failing vigorous corrective
measures a slow but certain process of destruction is going
on all the time. If we do not act there is a very real danger
that, instead of fulfilling its high purpose as a centre for
harmonizing the actions of nations in the achievement of
the objectives set cut in the Charter, the United Nations
will become a side-show on the international scene, its
activities brushed aside as irrelevant.
48. There are three areas in which remedial action is
imperative: first, the United Nations, including all its organs
and associated agencies, is drowning in a sea of words — to
which I am contributing this morning. Talk is of the essence
at the United-Nations, but to be useful it must be kept
within reasonable bounds. As we all know, this is not being
done. The number of conferences and meetings, and the
paper they produce, have increased to the point that even
those Members with the largest resources have difficulty in
providing competent representation and coping with the
flood of paper. As the conference-load increases there has
been a corresponding decrease in effectiveness. This has led
Governments to attach less importance to United Nations
activities and efforts. The credibility of the United Nations
as a negotiating forum and as an instrument for resolving
the world’s problems is wasting away. Public confidence in
the Organization is being weakened and public support is
being undermined.
49. We can, and should, act to arrest this process by
identifying priorities and dealing with them in an effective
and businesslike way. We must also find the new techniques
needed to deal with the problem of the unwieldy size of
United Nations committees and boards, particularly those
responsible for United Nations action programmes in the
all-important field of development, Some of these boards
are almost as large as the United Nations itself was not so
many years ago, and have proved ill-suited to fulfil the
purposes for which they were created.
50. I urge these measures because I believe they are
essential to the future progress of the Organization. At the
same time we should acknowledge that such remedial
action can deal only with the symptoms rather than with
the disease itself. Member nations, locked in out-dated
concepts of sovereignty and national interest, find debate
to be a convenient substitute for action. As long as this
attitude persists the United Nations cannot hope to fulfil
the aspirations of its founders.
51. Secondly, even with the benefit of nearly a quarter-century
we do not seem to have learned the lesson that
confrontation between nations is no substitute for negotiation.
During the past few years there has been mounting
evidence that the great Powers have recognized the sterility
of cold-war policies, but we have yet to see this realization
translated into effective action. There is also the practice,
which has become so common that it is taken for granted,
of forcing the Assembly to vote on resolutions that attempt
to translate moral judgements into calls for actions which
the Organization manifestly has not the capacity, nor, in
some cases, the legal authority to carry out. Resolutions of
this kind only hurt the cause they purport to serve.
52. Thirdly, the programmes and activities carried out by
the United Nations family of organizations have multiplied
during the last ten years. During that period the total of the
assessed budgets has more than doubled, and, if the present
growth rate were to continue, would reach half a billion
dollars by 1974. The absence of effective control of budget
expansion has meant that priorities have become blurred.
Programmes have been carried on long after they have
ceased to be relevant to needs. Staff with inadequate
qualifications or capacities have been recruited and kept on
rather than weeded out, and as a result the quality of the
work of the Organization has deteriorated.
53. The cure for this illness is a period of consolidation of
existing activities before striking out in too many new
directions. Action of this kind will enable us to take best
advantage of the useful advise that will be forthcoming in
the report of the Enlarged Committee for Programme and
Co-ordination and in Sir Robert Jackson’s study on the
capacity of United Nations agencies to administer development
assistance programmes.
54. I feel that I must express in the strongest terms my
conviction that continued failure to deal effectively with
these institutional problems has already begun to erode the
foundations of the United Nations as a cathedral of hope
for the aspirations of mankind. Powerful and wealthy
nations may be able to contemplate this process with only a
modicum of concern. For most Member nations represented
here, however, such a prospect is intolerable.
55. Madam President, you are known to all of us for your
personal devotion to the United Nations as well as for being
the distinguished representative of a Charter Member which
has contributed much to the Organization. What I have just
said shows that we share the views, expressed so cogently in
your speech [1753rd meeting], about the future of this
institution and what Member States must do about it. For
these reasons, may I express the hope that in fulfilling your
high office as President of this Assembly, you, and the
officers elected to assist you, will accept as a challenge to
your leadership the urgent need to launch a vigorous
programme of renewal? The new shoe of restraint and
self-discipline will be bound to pinch for a time, but the
resources saved can be used for constructive purposes. I am
sure I speak for many delegations as well as my own when I
pledge to do everything possible to assist you in this task.
56. I make this appeal today, because it offers the only
avenue for a renewed United Nations with a more stream-lined
and effective structure, where Member nations will
seek solutions rather than empty propaganda victories, a
United Nations that will be more truly representative of the
aspirations of mankind. Such a revitalized organization
would be better able to come to grips with its great dual
task: to keep the peace and to improve the conditions of
life on earth.
57. To keep the peace. This is the primary purpose of the
United Nations. The supreme challenge is to find something
better than the balance of mutual fear and deterrence on
which the present uneasy structure of global security rests.
The new weapons now in the final stages of development in
the Soviet Union and the United States give a new urgency
to this task. Unless the world seizes this moment to stop
the upward spiral in arms race technology we run a very
real risk of a breakdown in the equilibrium of deterrence
that now provides what security we have.
58. I should like to say here that Canada regards the
strategic arms limitations talks that the Soviet Union and
the United States have agreed to hold as the most
significant development in recent years. We urge both
parties to begin at once. If the talks are entered upon in
good faith, with goodwill and without delay, they could
prove to be a turning point in world history.
59. At the last session of the General Assembly, Canada
joined most Members of the United Nations in welcoming
the achievement of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons [resolution 2373 (XXII)]. We were the
first nation with nuclear capacity to ratify this Treaty.
What the Treaty contains is important enough, but its
promises are at least equally significant. None of the
provisions of the non-proliferation Treaty is more vital than
Article VI in which all parties to the Treaty — and this
applies particularly to the nuclear Powers — agree “to pursue
negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to
cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to
nuclear disarmament”.
60. Should we be discouraged by the slow rate of progress
or by the fact that although some ninety countries signed
the non-proliferation Treaty only seventeen have deposited
the necessary instruments of ratification? I do not think
we should be discouraged. One cannot afford to be
discouraged when the survival of mankind itself is at stake.
We look forward to this Treaty coming into force this year
and we urge its early ratification by all Governments that
have not yet done so.
61. One of the most encouraging events in the field of
arms control in recent days has been the coming into force
of the Treaty creating the Latin-American nuclear-free
zone, and Canada wishes to express its congratulations to
the Latin American countries responsible for this very
positive step.
62. Of all the arms control issues that have tried the
patience of the world in recent years, the most onerous has
been the effort to conclude a comprehensive test ban treaty
to supplement the 1963 Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapon
Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space and under Water.
The endless argument is continuing over whether on-site
inspection is necessary in order to verify violations of an
agreement to prohibit underground tests or whether
national means of seismological detection are adequate for
this purpose. At the last General Assembly a resolution
[2454 (XXIII)] was adopted calling for the highest priority
to be assigned to effective measures to limit the nuclear
arms race and to achieve nuclear disarmament. In the hope
that a step forward could be made toward overcoming the
verification problem, Canada proposed in the Conference of
the Committee on Disarmament at Geneva.that an international
system of seismic data collection should be
explored through inquiries to all Member States seeking
information about the facilities at their disposal and their
willingness to make information freely available to all
nations. This proposal will be pursued in this Assembly.
63. The sea-bed and the deep ocean floor are the last
earthly frontiers, The last General Assembly decided that
this new environment beyond the present limits of national
jurisdiction must be preserved for peaceful purposes.
Canada, as a country with one of the longest coastlines in
the world, has a vital interest in the fulfilment of that
decision. Consequently, when the arms control aspects of
this question were considered by the Conference of the
Committee on Disarmament in Geneva, we put forward
specific suggestions designed to ensure the protection of the
interests of coastal States and smaller countries. We were
particularly concerned to safeguard these interests through
adequate verification provisions to assure compliance with
any arms control treaty on the sea-bed.
64. The results of the deliberations of the standing
Committee on the Sea-Bed and the discussions on this
question by the Conference of the Committee on Disarmament
in Geneva are not all we had hoped would be
achieved. We shall nevertheless continue to co-operate
actively as a member of the standing Committee on the
Sea-Bed and as a member of the Geneva Disarmament
Committee in efforts to achieve the two main purposes of
the United Nations on these questions — first, to develop an
effective legal régime for the sea-bed and ocean floor
beyond the limits of national jurisdiction and second, to
ensure the preservation, for peaceful purposes, of the
largest possible area of the sea-bed.
65. I turn now to that other menace to the survival of the
human race — chemical and biological warfare. The
Secretary-General’s report has told us once again — if we needed
to be told — the tragic consequences of using these dreadful
weapons. At this Assembly we shall be considering proposals
to eliminate them.
66. We recognize the valuable contribution represented by
the draft convention for the prohibition of biological
methods of warfare prepared by Britain and submitted at
the Conference of the Committee on Disarmament. The
Secretary-General’s report together with proposals
advanced in Geneva and the draft convention put forward
in this Assembly by the Soviet Union [A/7655] will all
help to guide and facilitate our deliberations. The procedural
resolution Canada sponsored, which we hope will
be included in the report of the Conference of the
Committee on Disarmament, is directed to the same ends.
67. Let us remember, too, that the founders of the United
Nations provided in the Charter procedures for the pacific
settlement of disputes designed to stop the insane pattern
of fighting and bloodshed which, from time to time,
disfigures our globe and today particularly Viet-Nam, the
Middle East, and Nigeria. It is a sad commentary on the
state of the world community that it has no capacity to
order the cessation of hostilities, except to the extent that
the combatants are influenced by world public opinion.
The current tense situation in the Middle East perhaps
illustrates most graphically the nature of our dilemma. The
Security Council unanimously adopted on 22 November
1967 a resolution [242 (1967)] which imposed an equitable
balance of obligation on all the parties to the dispute.
Its full implementation could have restored peace to the
Middle East. Yet today the conflict continues to rage.
68. I am convinced we can do more to improve the
machinery to head off disputes before they erupt into open
warfare. This is why Canada is urging forward the peace-keeping
studies being carried on in the Committee of
Thirty-Three. In a working group of that Committee a
concerted effort has been made during the past year to
develop a “model” for the conduct of military observation
missions authorized by the Security Council. As a participant
in this study we have been encouraged by what has
been accomplished but at the same time we are disappointed
that the possibilities for much greater progress have
not been realized. Once the model for an observation
mission has been completed, the working group should go
on to develop models for other kinds of peace-keeping
operations.
69. There are difficult problems of a political, legal and
financial character. Perhaps, as a representative of a country
with a certain experience in peace-keeping operations I
might offer a comment. It is essential that these problems
should be given urgent consideration. There are many real
risks in dispatching peace-keeping forces in moments of
crisis without having worked out the necessary arrangements
in advance. Our experience in peace-keening forces
certainly reinforces that conclusion. The Committee of
Thirty-Three has been helpful in drawing attention to the
questions that must be answered. They have been less
successful in providing the answers. Meanwhile, Canada is
continuing, in the face of discouragingly slow political
progress in Cyprus, to participate in the peace-keeping
operation there, as well as in the United Nations
peace-observation missions in Palestine and Kashmir.
70. There is so much to be done to ease the suffering and
misery of the innocent civilians who get caught up in the
vortex of war. It was for this reason that Canada joined
with Norway at the recent International Conference of the
Red Cross in Istanbul in urging the adoption of a
declaration of principles on international humanitarian
relief to civilian populations in disaster areas. Two other
related resolutions, also co-sponsored by Canada, were
adopted at the Conference. One of those resolutions
established a committee to devise workable rules to
supplement existing humanitarian law; the other resolution
focused the attention of this new committee on
non-international armed conflicts.
71. The Canadian Government has lent its full support to
efforts by the International Red Cross to go further than
has heretofore proven possible to build a system of legal as
well as moral standards of humanitarian behaviour. We are
extremely gratified at the success achieved at the
International Conference of the Red Cross and we pledge to do
our utmost to follow up the Conference decisions with
specific action.
72. The second great goal of the United Nations is to bring
economic and social justice to the world by providing an
opportunity for the developing countries to escape the
treadmill of poverty on which so many are trapped. If we
can liberate the creative and productive powers of the
untold numbers of men and women whose energies are now
bound up in the struggle to exist, the future horizons of
mankind will be immensely enlarged. There are many who
say that such a goal is Utopian. I say that the words of the
United Nations Charter are testimony that for a generation
the world’s leaders have believed that it is attainable.
73. Let us have no doubt about it: a great deal has been
done. Development assistance has reached record levels and
developing nations are becoming increasingly skillful at
shaping and implementing plans for economic and social
advancement. The economic indicators show that the poor
nations are making more headway in their struggle to break
the shackles of poverty.
74. What is being done does not yet, however, match the
need and some recent trends give cause for serious concern.
Although the volume of assistance has grown substantially
during the past decade, continued growth is threatened by
economic difficulties and, to some extent, by disenchantment
in some key developed countries. In recent years the
terms on which assistance is granted have shown a marked
tendency to harden. For many developing countries the
growing burden of debt service is eating away at foreign
exchange earnings already eroded by falling prices for many
of their traditional exports, and by barriers to their access
to markets.
75. It is for this reason that the study being undertaken by
the World Bank’s Commission on International Development,
headed by a former Prime Minister of Canada and
former President of this Assembly, the Right Honourable
Lester B. Pearson, and Sir Robert Jackson’s study of the
capacity of the development machinery of the United
Nations are so important and so timely. Their reports will
provide new insights into the strength and weaknesses of
past policies and procedures, and their recommendations
will provide the basis, I hope, for more effective
international action in the future.
76. Never before has there been such a concerted assault
by mankind on poverty and restricted opportunity. Yet
even greater efforts are required to broaden the base of
public support throughout the world for the cause of
international development in the Second United Nations
Development Decade. Setting guidelines and targets is only
a beginning. Success or failure will ultimately depend on
the determination of us all, the developed and developing
countries and the international institutions, as together we
come to grips with specific development projects.
77. Let me for a moment relate these considerations to
Canadian policy. It is our declared national objective to
improve the lot of the poor and underprivileged through
development and trade. The level of the Canadian development
assistance programme has increased very substantially
in recent years and, despite the application of budgetary
restraints to high-priority domestic programmes, it will
continue to grow.
78. Moreover, we are making a determined effort to
improve. the quality of our development assistance and our
capacity to administer the larger programme that we
envisage for the future. Our experience has convinced us
that development is hindered as much by a lack of
knowledge, or a failure to apply the knowledge already
available, as by inadequate resources. At this particular
moment in time the knowledge gap is even more critical
than the resource gap.
79. As a contribution to meeting this need, we expect to
introduce legislation in the forthcoming session of the
Canadian Parliament to provide for the establishment of a
Canadian international development research centre. The
goal of this centre will be to devise and develop new ways
to apply science and technology and the latest techniques
of analysis to overcoming the very subtle combinations of
political, economic and social factors that hinder the
process of development. Although the direction and operation
of the centre will be a Canadian responsibility, it is
intended to enlist the aid of experts and scholars from all
parts of the world.
80. To keep the peace and to improve the conditions of
life on earth: these are tasks that call for all that is best in
us. They will be fulfilled if we can lift our eyes from the
marrow concerns of transient political advantage and
national self-interest to a broader horizon that encompasses
the whole family of man. We are all bound up together. It is
together that we must learn to live in peace, it is together
that we must apply all our resources to the betterment of
the human condition. The United Nations can be the
supreme instrument for the achievement of those great
tasks. It can also become no more than a monument to
man’s lost hopes and lost opportunities. It is the Member
countries that will determine what course this Organization
will follow, and like you, Madam President, we have faith.