S/PV.1625 Security Council

May I start by saying how happy 1 am to see our Secretary-General with us for the first time. I wish to take this opportunity to greet Mr, Waldheim and 14. I wish to associate my delegation with the moving tribute which you, Mr. President, paid to U Thant for the 10 years he served our Organization with total physical, mental and moral dedication. 15. I should also like to reiterate the appreciation we expressed at the last meeting of 1971 to the five outgoing members of the Council, with which we enjoyed close and gratifying co-operation. 16. Five new members-Guinea, India, Panama, Sudan and Yugoslavia-have joined us and I take pleasure in welcoming them on behalf of the Italian delegation. Italy enjoys excellent relations with all these countries, and their delegations have for a long time worked closely with mine in a spirit of co-operation heightened by personal friend. ship. We look forward to further fruitful co-operation with them in the Council, and I personally rejoice in the prospect of working in the main body of the United Nations with such esteemed colleagues and good old and new friends as Ambassadors Tour& Sen, Boyd, Fakhreddine and Mojsov. 17. Last but not Ieast, I wish to congratulate you, Mr. President, on the high responsibility that has fallen to you. I am confident that you will guide us with your well-known and highly appreciated sense of responsibility, your energy, your knowledge of international affairs and your ability through a month of unusual-activity for the Council. The moving message you addressed to us in your opening remarks of this morning [162&h meeting] strengthens our confidence in a successful month of work under your guidance. 18. I turn now to the item on our agenda. 19. The African countries have through their organization expressed the desire that the Council should hold meetings in Africa in the framework of co-operation between the Organization of African Unity and the United Nations.’ The General Assembly on 20 December 1971 adopted resolution 2863 (XXVI), bytwhich it: “Znvites the Security Council to consider the request of the Organization of African Unity concerning the holding of meetings of the Council in an African capital.” We are now convened to examine that request. 20. MY country fully understands and appreciates the motives that prompted the Organization of African Unity

Mr. President, may I first of all extend to you, as have previous speakers, best wishes and congratulations on your accession to the presidency of the Council. My wishes are not confined, of course, to the one-month period during which you will discharge the high functions of the presidency, but extend to the whole year. I do not doubt that your presidency will be beneficial to the Council as a whole. Your activity and your talents are well known and-if I may say so at this early stage-you have already made a good beginning. 21. Italy is therefore ready in principle to go along with the proposal-which you, Mr. President, outlined in your statement-to hold a short series of meetings in an African capital, which seems to meet with the consent of the majority of members of this Council, though with some understandable reservations. 22. From a general point of view we certainly feel that the co-operation between the Organization of African Unity and the United Nations that has developed through several resolutions of the General Assembly can be strengthened by holding a constructive, successful short series of meetings of the Security Council in Africa. In this connexion, however, my delegation cannot fail to state clearly that it is fully aware, as certainly all Council members are, of the delicate problems that the holding of meetings of the Security Council outside New York gives rise to. It will be the first time in about 20 years that such meetings will take place and therefore we do not have enough experience to guide us. We realize that before we leave we must have a clear idea of how to solve a number of legal, technical and, especially, financial problems. In particular it must be ensured that the Council will be in a position to meet any unforeseen or unexpected situation in the world and at the same time the Council must be guaranteed the same conditions of operation in Africa that it enjoys at its main Headquarters. 27. I should also like to extend my best wishes to the five delegations that have today joined the Council-those of Guinea, India, Panama, the Sudan and Yugoslavia. We are sure these delegations will make an extremely valuable contribution to our work, and we congratulate them on it in advance. 28. Lastly, we should of course like to express our best wishes to the new Secretary-General of the Organization, Mr. Waldheim, and to say how happy we are to see him among us for the first time. He knows how highly we esteem his capacities and his character, and how much confidence we place in him for the accomplishment of the important and onerous tasks entrusted to him. 29. I now come to the item on our agenda. As our Minister for Foreign Affairs stated at the commemorative session celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Organization,2 France is never deaf to the voices of Africa. Very close bonds of friendship and of co-operation tie us to Africa; we feel the deepest sympathy for the causes it upholds, for those causes in general advocate principles that are also ours. We therefore wish to take into account the desires expressed by the African States, and in voting in the General Assembly in favour of resolution 2863 (XXVI) the French delegation already indicated that it would be ready when the time came to consider the question of a possible Security Council meeting in Africa with a most open mind. 23, I do not want to dwell on those problems now. I hope that the committee the Council is apparently ready to set up will find the appropriate answers to those questions and the others I have mentioned. 24. I should like now only to stress two points, which concern the cost of the meetings and their political preparation. Given the seriously deteriorating financial situation now facing the United Nations, we should do the utmost to contain the costs of the meetings away from Headquarters within the limits of the indispensable minimum expenses. We should decide to take the Council to Africa only on condition that those limits are not exceeded. We trust the Secretariat will help us in this respect with its usual competence and efficiency. 30. My delegation therefore willingly accepts the principle of meetings in Africa and we are ready to participate in discussions on the implementation of this principle. We have no objections, on the whole, to the proposals put forward by the President this morning. In particular we approve the idea of appointing a committee, as well as the programme of work that was suggested by him. We hope that the committee will be able to finish its work in a very short time but with all the necessary care, because we cannot overemphasize the importance of the preparations. Indeed, the success of the meetings will very largely depend on all the conditions-technical, administrative and also political-in which they take place. We do of course wish them to be very successful, not only for the good of the United Nations but also for the good of Africa. 25. As far as preparations for the meetings are concerned, we feel they should be as accurate and complete as possible. That is why we feel that the committee should give highest priority to the establishment of our agenda and to the careful, detailed preparation of our work. We rather doubt whether the committee will have enough time if it has to report within three days, as you, Mr. President, have suggested, to recommend general guidelines for meetings of the Council away from Headquarters of the United 2 Ibid., Twenty-fifth Session, Plenary Meetings, 1879th meeting. 32. As if your background and experience were not sufficient, this morning you made a magnificent statement in which you brought out points that should be borne very closely in mind by all delegations, and most particularly by those that continuously proclaim their support of the great principles of the Charter but in practice and in fact undermine and flout these principles. Your statement this morning, I am sure, will provide food for serious thought for all of the representatives present here. 33. I should also like to convey my congratulations to the five delegations and friends which joined the Security Council on 1 January: the delegation of Guinea and its representative, Ambassador Tour& the delegation of India and Ambassador Sen; the delegation of .Panama and its representative, Ambassador Boyd; the delegation of the Sudan and its representative, Ambassador Fakhreddine, and my good friend and neighbour to my right, Ambassador Mojsov, the representative of Yugoslavia. We are bound together by long ties of friendship from the days when we shared posts and problems together in Vienna. 34. Allow me also to offer a very special word of welcome to the representative of our sister delegation of Panama, not only as the representative of a Latin American delegation, but also because of the cordial ties of friendship which have traditionally bound his country, people and Government with those of Argentina. 35. I should also like to state once again here the ideas that I had the privilege of expounding before the General Assembly3 on the occasion when we submitted for the Assembly’s consideration the draft resolution designating Mr. Kurt Waldheim as the Secretary-General of the United Nations. His intelligence, his qualities as a diplomat and statesman and his well recognized patience and tenacity are attributes that I am sure will enable him to discharge his difficult and serious responsibilities with full success and in advance we associate ourselves with that success, We know that Mr. Waldheim will be a worthy successor to U Thant. 36. The agenda item that is before us deals with the possibility of holding meetings of the Security Council in an African capital. To discuss this, we have as a background document resolution 2863 (XXVI), which of course my delegation supported and voted for, 37. It is from the African continent that the largest numbers of countries have emerged to independence in recent years and it is from that continent that the largest 3 Ibid., Twenty-siwth Session, Plenary Meetings, 2031~~ meeting. 38. We therefore support the suggestions that you, Mr. President, made to us at the meeting this morning concerning the idea that we should accept in principle the request put to us by the Organization of African Unity and that we should create a committee that would be responsible for the detailed but nevertheless important arrangements that should be taken into account in order to make these meetings a reality. 39. With respect to the agenda and the venue my delegation will set forth its views at the meetings of that committee. With respect to the date, my delegation would like to state forthwith that, if it is decided to hold these meetings, it will be our wish, our most fervent desire to ensure that they should be held under your presidency; in saying this I mean, of course, that the meetings should be held towards the end of January.

Let me begin, Mr. President, by extending to you my delegation’s congratulations on your accession to the presidency of the Security Council for the month of January. At the same time I should like to wish you every success in your duties and to assure you of my delegation’s full co-operation. 41. I am happy also to be able to greet at this first Security Council meeting of the year the new Secretary- General, Mr. Waldheim. I should like to wish him every success in his difficult task and I assure him of my delegation’s full co-operation. 42. While differing from individuals, States do nevertheless have their individual personalities, which give an irreplaceable character to their membership in any international organization and in particular their membership in the Security Council. It is in this spirit that I should like to associate myself with previous speakers in welcoming Guinea, India, Panama, the Sudan and Yugoslavia, which have been elected members of the’ Security Council for a two-year period beginning 1 January 1972. I should like to express to the representatives of those countries my delegation’s satisfaction at seeing them associated in the tireless work of the Security Council for international peace and security. Our common hope, I am sure, is that the new members will show themselves worthy of the confidence placed in them by the international community when they were chosen to discharge the crucial function of the Security Council. In the past we have received from one or another of those new members numerous pledges of their intention to serve as loyal servants of the international order guaranteed by the Charter of our Organization. It is 5 1. I have listened to this debate with much care and it seems to me that certain points come through quite clearly. In the first place, there is no doubt that the Security Council, like the General Assembly, is sympathetic to and indeed actively wishes to co-operate with the Organization of African Unity and that it fully realizes the importance of African problems to the United Nations. My delegation shares these sentiments. However, as many speakers have shown, it is not simply a question of waving a wand which will transport the Council by magic carpet to wherever it wants to go. There are some hard and difficult problems on which we must make up our minds before we reach a decision. 43. I should not wish to conclude my intervention without requesting you, Mr. President, to be so kind as to convey once again to the delegations of Burundi, Nicaragua, Poland, Sierra Leone and the Syrian Arab Republic my delegation’s regret at their departure and the memory of co.operation which they left us. 44. I should like now to turn to the item on our agenda for this afternoon’s meeting. 52. In the first place, there is the question of principle, which has been referred to by the representative of Italy. The same Article 28 of the Charter which authorizes us to meet elsewhere than at Headquarters also requires us to be organized so that we can function continuously. We must be in a position to deal with emergencies. We cannot afford to find ourselves immobilized. We have all seen how incidents can blow up out of a blue sky. Only a few months ago, I recall, we were summoned to a meeting at two hours’ notice, and I think it was on a Sunday afternoon in July. We can all think of a number of other incidents all over the world which required emergency action. This is a problem which we must examine very carefully, and I am afraid we cannot ignore it. 45. During the last session of the General Assembly my delegation voted in favour of resolution 2863 (XXVI). I should like, therefore, to repeat here what I said in the informal consultations, namely, that my delegation accepts the principle of holding meetings of the Security Council in an African capital in the course of 1972. My delegation feels, however-and I believe that this is a conviction which we owe to the peoples of Africa-that this series of meetings must be a resounding success. For this reason, Mr. President, my delegation subscribes to the idea that you expressed at the morning meeting, that a working group or committee of the Council be appointed to consider the various aspects and the various problems raised by the organization of these meetings, 53. There is, of course, the question of precedent. My delegation cannot regard any decision to hold meetings in Africa as necessarily a precedent for the future, but we accept that guidelines should be drawn up for the conduct of any meeting away from New York and, provided that the committee does a thorough job in preparing the ground rules for holding meetings in Africa, I hope we shall find that these rules will be of general applicability. 46. The first idea that comes to my mind is that the committee should consider the political preparations for the meetings and in particular discuss their agenda and the conclusions they should come to. Furthermore, I think the committee could usefully address itself to a whole series of administrative, legal and financial problems that would be raised by such meetings. Moreover, it should concern itself with setting a specific date and place for the meetings. 54. Finally, there is the question of finance. I think we shall need to look at this very carefully. I realize that other committees spend large sums of money, but the Security Council is, after all, the most responsible body in the United Nations complex. It must not waste money and it should act responsibly. 47. You can rest assured that my delegation will extend its fullest co-operation to the working group, and we hope that the group will complete its work in the shortest possible time,

Mr. President, I should like to follow my colleagues in bidding you welcome here. Having worked with you over the past 12 months, we have alI been filed with admiration for your hard work, your intelligence and your patience and fertility in negotiation. I look forward very much to working with you as President, and I assure you of the full co-operation of my delegation. 55. For all those reasons, my delegation supports the proposal for a committee to examine the issues and agrees that it should meet urgently to arrive at early decisions. We also feel that it would be wiser if we ourselves did not take any decisions until we had heard from the committee itself.

This is the first time that the Guinean delegation has sat as a member of the Security Council, an event which happens to coincide with the Council’s first meeting in 1972. May I therefore be permitted, first of all, to express our rightful pride at having been elected to this important body and to tell you how desirous we are of making a positive 49. I should like also on behalf of my delegation to welcome the five new members that have joined the Council this year. I know they will be of great help and we shall be happy to work with them. 57. Mr. President, chance, which often arranges things well, has determined that you, the Permanent Representative of Somalia to the United Nations and in the Security Council-the representative of a great and dynamic African country and founding member of the Organization of African Unity, with which the Republic of Guinea maintains the best of brotherly relations-should have been called upon to preside over the Council’s debates this month. We know you to be a man of great ability, an experienced diplomat and one familiar with international and African questions. For several years now you have presided expertly and in masterly fashion over the Special Committee on Apar~/zheid, and your clear, tirm and relevant statements have had repercussions far beyond these walls. We are convinced that you will guide the debates of the Security Council in equally expert fashion. 58. Chance has also willed that we have on our agenda at the beginning of this year a request by Africa, submitted through the Organization of African Unity, for the Security Council to meet in an African capital. The first steps taken by you, Mr. President, and the consultations that you have undertaken, lead us to believe that the request will meet with a favourable reception; of this we are convinced. 59. Today we have among us our new Secretary-General, who is attending the debates of the Security Council for the first time in that capacity. The Government of the Republic of Guinea has already conveyed to him its sincere congratulations and best wishes for success in dealing with the burdensome tasks that fall upon him as the head of the United Nations. We should like to tell him here that he wilI find in the Guinean delegation a continuing readiness to help and devotion to the noble ideals of the Charter. 60. Turning now to the item on our agenda my delegation had occasion to submit to the Security Council in document S/10477, dated 29 December 1971, its views on the idea of holding Security Council meetings in Africa. While expressing our satisfaction at having contributed to some degree to reviving this question in the Council, we consider that the facilities available in the various African capitals are evidence of our continent’s commitment to the solution of the many problems facing us-and in particular, decolonization, apartheid, the problem of Zimbabwe and Nami- Ma-which are anachronisms that we must eradicate from the present-day scene. 61. My delegation subscribes to the idea of setting up a committee to study the various aspects of the question of holding meetings of the Security Council in Africa. In this connexion, we express the hope that speedy conclusions will be reached, SO that the Council will be able to meet m Africa in the very near future. In any event, and whatever the conclusions drawn by the committee may be, the Government of the Kepublic of Guinea solemnly reaffirms its invitation &to the Security Council and to all of its members to come to Conakry, our capital, a city martyred by the colonialist aggression of 22 November 1970, the 62. Finally, before concluding, I should like to thank all of the representatives of friendly countries that have extended a word of welcome on the arrival of the five new members in the Security Council, and also to offer to our new colleagues our sincere congratulations.

I should like to inform members of the Council that I have just received a letter [S/10504] from the representative of Saudi Arabia, Ambassador Baroody, requesting that he be invited to participate in the Council’s discussion this afternoon in accordance with the provisions of Article 31 of the Charter and the provisional rules of procedure of the Security Council. Unless I hear any comment from members of the Council I shall take it that the Council wishes, in accordance with the usual practice, to accede to the request of the representative of Saudi Arabia. At the invitation of the President, Mr. J, M. Baroody (Saudi Arabia) took a place at the Council table.

I call on the representative of Saudi Arabia.

Mr. President, allow me to tender to you my congratulations and my thanks for making it possible for me to address myself to the question of which the Council is seized. 66. You are fortunate, Sir, in assuming your post in the first month of 1972, which so far, thank God, has been peaceful. Gt us hope that this year will be less turbulent than the last one and that relative peace will prevail in a world that sorely needs it. 67. I feel heartened by the presence of our new Secretary General in the Council. Let us all hope that, with the assistance of all members, he will witness with us the turning of a new leaf in international realtions. 68. I feel constrained to address the Council on a matter that is strictly financial, knowing in what plight this Organization finds itself in making ends meet. I will go along with my African colleagues and agree that after so many years of travesty-and, I should say, failure-in dealing with colonial issues on their continent, it is high time that the African people, and, for that matter, the Asian people, should be assured that the United Nations is deeply concerned, ‘and more so the Security Council, which is supposed to be the arbiter of questions that may threaten international peace. 69. However, I believe that there should be certain preconditions for holding such meetings of the Council away from Headquarters. 71. Second, we should be guided by our experience in having twice held the General Assembly away from Headquarters, namely, in the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, in 1948 and 1951. I would not embarrass my colleague from France by praising his beloved country for having worked day and night for many months before in order to make our sojourn in the City of Light an agreeable one and at the same time an efficient one with regard to our work. I participated in both those sessions. The last one carried over into 1952, as my colleague from France may still remember, because we could not finish our work in time, as we had planned to do. 76. So now there remains $100,000. I would not say that each non-permanent member should contribute $10,000. No, they should contribute in accordance with their assessments in the United Nations, and the remaindermark my words-should then be distributed pro rata amongst them and the five permanent members, in order to alleviate the burden on those that are not flush with funds. 72. Third, another precondition is that time should be given to the African host country to make sufficient preparation to ensure smooth working for the Council, and to be able to take all the precautionary measures necessary to ensure the security of members of the Council and their aides. You are all here very precious to me personally; many of you are my friends and I want to make sure that you come back safely: Africa is in turmoil, though you cannot blame the Africans. I was young once myself and I know what nationalism is. It takes only a bullet to make short shrift of any one of us, including myself. This is no matter for laughter. You have families; if you do not care about your lives, think about your families. 77. Is that clear? You are the businessman, Ambassador Bush. I should like to hear a comment from you on this later. 78. The United States, the Soviet Union, France, the People’s Republic of China and the United Kingdom would contribute two thirds, $200,000. The other $lOO,OOOassuming that the whole project will cost $300,000-would be paid on the basis of what I have just said. 73. Fourth, the committee of the Council should prepare in advance all the necessary details and negotiate with the host country concerning those details and the preparations. 79. The application of the assessment of the non-members to the $100,000 is one way. But if it is going to create some hardship for some, they will pay what they can and the rest will be shared pro rata by all the membership. In any event, the members of the Council know very well that when a Foreign Minister comes from abroad it costs his Government at least $10,000 during the two weeks that he is here for the session. Therefore, it should not be a burden on the non-permanent members to contribute that amount pro rata. 74.. Fifth, the series of Council meetings away from New York, whether in Africa or elsewhere, should not constitute a precedent, unless the country or group of countries that demands another such session will foot the bill in toto. 75. The sixth and last point I should like to bring to the attention of the Council is, I hope, financially just and relevant. And this is the crux of my statement. There are five permanent members who sit on this Council. With one of my colleagues, the Ambassador of Spain, I figured out hastily how much they contribute to the budget of the United Nations. They contribute two thirds of the budget of the United Nations, about 66 per cent. Taking into account the fact that the host country should provide the facilities at its own expense, and according to the figures I heard .,bandied about before I started to speak this afternoon, the sum of $300,000 will be necessary for such meetings, provided they do not take more than a week. This is why I say that sound preparations, meticulous preparations, should be made so that the meetings of the Council will not be protracted more than is necessary. Sixty-six per cent would mean $200,000, pro rata, taking as the basis a cost of $300,000. This should be shouldered by the permanent members of the Council, pro rata, in accordance with their assessments. And do not tell me that they cannot afford $200,000. They are in agreement as to the principle of meeting in Africa; if they were not in agreement, they would not pay a cent. I know that some of 80. Now it might be asked, “Is Baroody complicating matters? ” Not at all. I am trying to facilitate matters by not creating a precedent for the future, because every Tom, Dick and Harry of a country that has a problem in the future will come and say to you: ‘Why did the Africans have meetings there? Is there any discrimination? In the United Nations we are against discrimination. Therefore, the next series of meetings should be in Asia. Another, perhaps, should be in the Far East; a third one should be in Latin America.” You cannot say no to them. Our African brothers would not want to have it appear that they have privileges. 81. The financial angle that I am trying to explain to the Council is an assurance that precedents will not come easily, because’there is the payment of money involved. If the morale of the African people at large would be raised by holding meetings of the Council in Africa, I do not see why the Council should not hold meetings there. There is no reason whatsoever if we think that such meetings of the 82. My concluding words are the following. Lest the peoples of Africa be disillusioned if nothing comes out of such meetings, which is quite possible-I would not want to say probable-I address myself to the five permanent members of the Council who can tip the balance between acting on a basis of justice or on a basis of expediency and self-interest. There should be a change of heart on the part of the five permanent members of the Council in dealing with African affairs. Otherwise, the locale will make no difference. On the contrary, should there be no change of heart on the part of the policy-makers of the five permanent members, I believe that not only the Africans but all peoples of the world will have a right to lose faith in the United Nations.

I thank the representative of Saudi Arabia for his valuable suggestions, which I am sure the Council will take into account when it deals with the modalities and other factors concerning the projected visit to Africa. 84. I now call on our Secretary-General, who wishes to reply to a number of statements addressed to him in the course of the debate today.

Mr. President, I wish to thank you and the members of the Security Council for the very kind and encouraging words which you have addressed to me, The manifold and intricate problems with which the Council is confronted are not new to me. Indeed, as you are all aware, I have followed with close attention the proceedings of the Council in the past. I am conscious of the enormous difficulties facing this principal organ, which has primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. I should like to assure the members of the, Council that in my capacity as Secretary- General I will do my utmost to discharge the mandate given to me by the States Members of the United Nations and to fulfil the tasks entrusted to me by the Council, in full accordance with the provisions of the Charter, 86, I also take this opportunity to convey to you, Mr. President, and to the members of the Council, my good wishes for the coming year and to express my fervent hope that 1972 will see the furtherance of the cause of peace in the world through the United Nations, and especially through your deliberations in the Security Council. 87. Mr. President, in concluding I should like to associate myself with the very kind and pertinent words which have been said by you and the other members of the Council about my distinguished predecessor U ‘I’hant. It will be a real privilege for me to convey to him your kind message.

We have now reached the conclusion of our debate and a number of decisions will be necessary, so that the question may be taken a stage further. I wish now to summarize the situation as I see it. It was so decided

The second decision relates to the period when this meeting should take place. The opinion was expressed during the course of consultations, and again during the course of this debate, that the Council meetings should take place preferably in ‘the period from the end of January to the beginning of February. There has been no objection to this proposal.

On a point of clarification and just to express the position of the United States delegation: if all the arrangements can be worked out-all of the details which I understood the committee was going to look into-we should have no objection to that. But I do not want our delegation to be in the position of agreeing to a specific date. As I understood the President’s statement on when the meetings should take place, it was fairly general; without knowing what all the arrangements are and taking into account the points that almost every representative has raised here today with regard to other arrangements, we could not take a final decision. 92. The way we view it, therefore, is that, generally, that would be a target which would be acceptable and agreeable to us, but not firm. I do not think we can separate that aspect from all the other arrangements. We do not even know where the meetings are going to take place right now. 93. So, with that reservation, I would agree with the statement of the President, but I do not know that we want to set such a firm and concrete date that it might make a certain host country arrangement impracticable. What I thought the committee was going to do was to explore some of these suggestions to find out what would be the best arrangements financially and from the point of view of security and other considerations. If a week sooner or later meant a better arrangement for the Security Council, I think we should not be precluded from considering that the meetings might start, for example, in the first week in February instead of at the end of January. 94, The PRESIDENT: The original proposal was that a period should be established and agreed upon and that the committee would then decideon the specific dates. The period suggested was the end of January and the beginning of February-one could say a period between 20 January and 20February, but leaving specific dates for the committee to decide. 95. Since it appears that the representative of the United States has no objection to establishing that period, and since there are no objections from other members of the Council, I shall take it that it is also the decision of the Council to set aside the period from 20 January to

The third decision would relate to the establishment of a committee composed of all the members of the Security Council. This committee would be called “Security Council Committee on Council Meetings away from Headquarters”. The committee would be provided with summary records. It would have to study the question which is at present before the Council, namely, the holding of meetings of the Council in an African capital, in all its aspects-technical, administrative, financial, legal, political and others. In so doing, the committee, in addition to preparing the ground for the implementation of this Council’s decision to accede, in principle, to the request of the Organization of African Unity, should endeavour to draft general guidelines which could be applied in all similar situations which might arise in the future in connexion with Article 28, paragraph 3, of the Charter, which authorizes the Security Council to “hold meetings at such places other than the seat of the Organization as in its judgment will best facilitate its work”.

I have two questions. Perhaps my first question has already been answered but I should like to know whether the President planned to invite representatives of the Office of Conference Services to attend that meeting of the Committee?

I have so far held two meetings with representatives of the Office of Conference Services, as well as with the financial, legal and administrative services, and all four will be represented at tomorrow morning’s meeting. 97. In this connexion the Council will no doubt wish to take into account the constructive proposal made by the representative of Italy, who suggested that in view of the time factor the committee might concentrate primarily on the African series of meetings, and that what emerged as the result of the guidelines set for that series of meetings could be applied mutatis mutandis to similar situations which might arise in the future. The committee would commence its meetings tomorrow morning and should submit its report in time for the Council to consider it not later than Monday, 17 January.

My second question is whether the President visualizes the meeting as a closed meeting or as a meeting open to the public and the press.

It is normal for such committees, as in the case of the Committee on Sanctions, to hold closed meetings. The meeting rose at 5.1.5 p.m. BOW TO OBTAIN UNITED NATIONS PUBLICATIONS United Nations publications may be obtained from books&as and distributors throughout the world. Coirsult your bookstore or write to: United Nations, Sales Section, New York or Geneva. COMMENT SE PROCURER LES PUBLICATIONS DES NATIONS UNIES Les publications des Nations Unies sont en vente dans les librairies et les agences depositaires du mondo entier. Informez-vous aup& de votre libraire ou adressez-vous A : Nations Unies, Section des ventes, New York ou Gen&ve. EjI3~aKm OpraHn3aqnH OCi%e~wxeHHbIx HaquR MO)I(HO xynw%% a KHU)KH~IX M&I-&- 3wnax u ~P~HTCTB&X BO acex patiowax mwpa. HaBoRuTe cnpasxu 06 x3Aazinsx a BarneM mnxnm MaramHe ma mmme no aapecy: OpraHn3aqnff 06neAnHeriHbIx HaqaB, CeKuHR IIo npoA%Ke HDAaHUti, HbHI-XOpK HlIW ~KeHeBa. COMO CONSEGUIR PUBLICACIONES DE LAS NACIONES UNIDAS Las publicaciones de las Naciones Unidas estin en venta en librerias y casas distribuidoras en tdaa partes de1 mundo. Consulte a su librero o dirfjase a: Naciones Unidas, SecciBn de Ventas, Nueva York o Ginebra. Lltho in United Nations, New York Price: $U,S, 1.00 (or equivalent in other currencies) 72-82006February 197%2,050