WARNING BY DULLES

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27735, 12 August 1955, Page 11

WARNING BY DULLES

War Could Be Provoked

WASHINGTON, August 10The United States Secretary of State (Mr Dulles) today told South Korea that efforts to unify Korea or any other divided nation by force could lead to the horrors of an atomic and hydrogen war. He also said that the South Korean President (Dr. Phee) was fully aware of the United States determination to protect the Communist members of th" Neutral Nations Commission in South Korea, even although the United States sympathised with Dr. Rhee’s dislike of the Communist officials — Czechs and Poles. Mr Dulles made the statements at his weekly press conference. He said there was some justification for South Korea’s belief that the Communist truce inspectors had been operating as spies. But, he added, they probably bi eked up no information that would not have reached the Communists anyway. He appealed to the South Koreans to be patient. He said the United States was pledged, under the Korean armistice terms, to protect the truce team, regardless of how it might feel about its members. Rifling out war as a means of uniting such divided nations as Korea, he said that such a course could lead to atomic devastation. The country might be united, he said, but humans now living would krow nothing about it. He a’so disputed a South Korean official’s statement that there was danger of a new Communist attack in Korea. He said the United States had no intelligence information to bear that out. “Provisions Obsolete” Mr Dulles conceded that many provisions of the 1953 Korean Armistice now seemed to be obsolete. Serious consideration was being given to how to change them, but it was difficult. He denied that the United States was giving tacit consent to the partition of Korea by its long silence on the ruestion. There were a good many divided nations in the world, but force should not be used to unite them. Unification eventually would come by other means. The Korean Armistice Commission was established in August, 1953, with the understanding that it would operate for only a short period until a permanent Korean near" was worked out. But the United Nations and the Communists have not been able + o agree on a permanent peace. The South Koreans are demanding that the Czech and Polish members leave by Saturday. The other members are from Switzerland and Sweden.