The West And Soviet To Take New Look At Arms Control

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27750, 30 August 1955, Page 11

The West And Soviet To Take New Look At Arms Control

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

(Rec. 8 p.m.)

NEW YORK, August 28.

The major Western Powers and the Soviet Union will take a new look at the disarmament problem at the United Nations Headquarters beginning tomorrow.

It will be the first test of how much farther the Soviet Union will go to relax tensions since the summit meetings in Geneva last month.

Moscow radio, on the eve of the opening of the talks, said the Soviet Union was expecting concessions from the West. The Russians, however, also promised to give serious consideration to Western .proposals aimed at banning atomic weapons. '

The Soviet Radio broadcast an article from “Izvestia” referring to the Soviet acceptance of French and British proposals for a phased reduction. “The Soviet Union is now entitled to expect that the Western Powers will make a step to meet the Soviet point of view in the banning of atomic weapons, which is of the greatest importance for solving the whole problem of disarmament.

Moscow Radio said that the Soviet Union “does not refuse to give its serious consideration to other proposals imbued with the endeavour to find ways to solve this problem.” The group meeting in New York tomorrow is the disarmament sub-com-mittee of the United Nations, a branch of the 12-nation Disarmament Commission made up of members of the Security Council with Canada added. Canada is included because of her important role in atomic energy. The representatives, meeting tomorrow in accordance with the directives drawn up by the Big Four heads of government at their conference in Geneva last month, will be:—Mr Anthony Nutting, the British Minister of State. Mr Harold Stassen, President Eisenhower’s chief adviser on disarmament. Mr Jules Moch (France). Mr Paul Martin, the Canadian Health Minister, and Mr Arkady Sobolev, the Soviet Union’s permanent representative at the United .Nations. The sub-committee had been established for the last two years and has met in London in an effort to find a common disarmament programme. It adjourned in London last June after the Soviet Union, on May 10, introduced proposals which seemed to ffo some way towards meeting the British and French plan for stage-by-stage disarmament, including the placing of ceilings on. armed forces and the eventual prohibition of atomic weapons. The Soviet Union, however, linked its proposals to other political items such as withdrawal of all occupation forces and the elimination of overseas bases—suggestions aimed at trying to break un the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and the withdrawal of the United States from Europe. At the Geneva Conference Marshal Nikolai Bulganin, the Soviet Prime Minister, reintroduced the Soviet disarmament plan, but made no mention of the other extraneous political matters. Also in Geneva. President Eisenhower proposed that the United States and the Soviet Union should exchange military blueprints and submit each others’ territory to aerial inspection. Sir Anthony Eden, the British Prime Minister, proposed that a start misht be made by instituting a plan for disarmament inspection on both sides of the present dividing line between East and West in Europe. Mr Edgar Faure. the French Prime Minister, suggested a system of budgetary control on armaments. > All these plans will be considered by the sub-committee with a view to seeing whether any progress can be made on the vital task of drawing up an adequate scheme for inspection and control of disarmament.

President Eisenhower proposed on Geneva, and the other three heads of government agreed, that the disarmament sub-committee should give "priority attention” to the subject of ''nspection and reporting. “Firm Plan Not Yet Likely”

Few observers believed today that any concrete disarmament plan is likely to emerge from the meetings beginning tomorrow. The prospects were said to be that the Five Powers would content themselves at the moment with a general review of all the proportions put forward so far with a view to doing some “tidving up” for the Big Four Foreign Ministers, who are to meet in Geneva in October. Sunnort for this view was seen in the Soviet decision to leave the present negotiations to Mr Sobolev rather than to send over to New York Mr Jacob Malik, the Ambassador to Britain. who has been in charge of all the detailed disarmament talks for the Soviet Union for the last two years. According to some informed sources, there was a prospect that progress rniefat be made on proposals for instituting ground check points as one method of insnection. The Soviet Union has made suggestions in this respect, namely, that controls be set up at airports, seaports, on main roads, and at railway junctions. The United States appears to be thinking on the same lines with a view to setting up an “alarm system” which would prevent surnrise attack, while the proposal of Sir Anthony Eden would seem to incorporate basically the same idea.