CONTROL OF SPACE

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28537, 17 March 1958, Page 11

CONTROL OF SPACE

Interest Pleases Sir Leslie Munro (Rec. 10 p.m.) WASHINGTON, March 16. The President of the United Nations General Assembly, Sir Leslie Munro, of New Zealand, said that he was glad to hear the Soviet Union was ready to have the question of control of outer space dealt with by the United Nations. He was commenting on the declaration by the Soviet Union in Moscow yesterday proposing for summit discussions a plan which would prohibit the use of outer space for war purposes and the use of foreign military bases. While welcoming the Soviet readiness to discuss the control of outer space. Sir Leslie Munro said: “I do not consider that the question of control through the United Nations of the spatial area should be limited by the question of the control of overseas bases. I profoundly believe that the use of present bases is essential to the free world. “I also wish to draw attention to the -fact that Mr John Foster Dulles, th: Secretary of State, in an address to the National Press Club in Washington on January 16 made this point on the question of controlling the use of outer space: There would, I suppose, need to be some kind of an international commission, presumably dnd preferably under the auspices of the United Nations, .which would have a task perhaps comparable to the task of the International Atomic Energy Agency

“I completely agree with this analogy, as I have already indicated in previous statements,” Sir Leslie Munro said. “We live in a world of rapidly advancing technocracy. It is my judgment that political developments must keep pace with the advances of technocracy. It is for that reason that 1 believe the United Nations should deal with this matter is quickly as possible.”