WORK COMPLETED

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 67, Issue 55, 14 December 1946, Page 5

WORK COMPLETED

FOREIGN MINISTERS IN NEW YORK ACTION AGAINST SPAIN (N.Z. Press Association —Copyright.) NEW YORK, Dec. 31. The Foreign Ministers completed their New York peace-making sessions when they cleared up a number of deferred routine questions to-day. The meeting was the thirty-third in New York and the hundred and twenty-second since the Ministers began in September, 1945, to write peace treaties for Italy, Rumania, Bulgaria, Finland and Hungary. The headquarters committee of the United Nations voted 33-7 to accept the offer of Mr J. D. Roekfeller, junior, of 8,500,000 dollars for a skyscraper site in Manhattan as a permanent home for the United Nations. The recommendation now goes to the General Assembly, and it will there require a two-thirds majority for ratification, 30 votes being necessary if there is a full attendance. The Manhattan site is now cluttered with packing houses, parking lots, taxi-garages, boarded up tenements and laundries. It is known as a dqad-end area, but its thousands of feet of sheer rock beneath the surface make it about the most favourable spot in the city for the construction of a skyscraper. The United States spearheaded the drive for this location. Franco Spain , x The General Assembly decided to ask all members immediately to withdraw their representatives from Madrid. The resolution branded the Franco Government as Fascist and barred it from participation in any international organisations to be established under the United Nations. The proposal to withdraw ambassadors falls short of the outright break in diplomatic and commercial relations sought by the more vigorous anti-Franco forces, their demands being tempered by British and American fears that too severe measures might touch off a Spanish civil war. The resolution, which was passed by 34 votes to' six, was denounced by Senor Hector Castro (El Salvador) _as intervention in Spain’s internal affairs, which is outside the United Nations jurisdiction. His speech was followed by boos and cheers from the public galleries. The United Press points out that none of the Big Powers at present maintain relations with Spain, and although there is no compulsion it is hoped that other nations will also withdraw their representatives. The resolution also cleared the way for possible action by the Security Council, which was asked to consider “adequate measures:” to be taken if, within a reasonable time, the Spanish Government is not established on a more democratic basis. The Security Council unanimously approved Siam’s application for membership of the United Nations.