SEATO AIMS CHANGING

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27912, 8 March 1956, Page 13

SEATO AIMS CHANGING

Economic Aid Emphasised (Rec. 8 p.m.) KARACHI, March 7. The development of economic cooperation in the SEATO area ia the major problem facing the Ministerial Council of the organisation at its conference in Karachi. The thread which ran through most of today’s speeches was the purely defensive nature of the alliance and the urgent need to improve the lot of the poorer Asian members. The major problem is how to develop economic co-operation with resources already strained and limited by domestic political considerations. According to United States and British sources, neither Washington nor London is in a position to inject more money for economic assistance than at present. Delegates say it is France which, through her new Foreign Minister. Mr Christian Pineau. is emphasising more than any other nation the urgency of converting the pact into an association largely concerned with raising living standards. Reports of the pact's economic committee will probably be considered tomorrow. With France’s shrinking territory in the SEATO area, her position already has caused some speculation and statements by Mr Pineau deprecating military assistance to the area have heightened the speculation. A clue to France’s support of economic assistance rather than military aid might lie in the reported decision that she will not in any circumstance participate in any military disturbance which might arise in the SEATO area in future.

This appears to fit fairly into her changed policy because France’s reign in South-east Asia has come to an end. Presumably with armed forces being withdrawn from her former Indo-China empire, they will in future be concentrated in North Africa, where France’s colonial problems are mounting.