PRE-GENEVA TALKS

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29130, 16 February 1960, Page 15

PRE-GENEVA TALKS

U.S. May Have No Plan For Meeting

(Rec. 9.30 p.m.) NEW YORK, Feb. 15.

United States officials said today that they were doubtful whether they would have a systematic disarmament plan ready in time to submit to the five Western disarmament delegation heads now meeting in Washington, the “New York Times” reported today in a dispatch from Washington. Some of the delegates, representing Britain, France, Italy and Canada, had expressed irritation that the leader of the Western alliance was not prepared for the task of working out the Western counter to the general disarmament plan of the Soviet Prime Minister (Mr Khrushchev), the newspaper said. The delegates will meet five Soviet bloc delegates, representing the Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Rumania, in Geneva in a month. Washington diplomats believed that apart from the propaganda importance of answering the Soviet proposal, the Geneva meeting could present opportunities to probe the Soviet intentions in regard to the coming EastWest summit meeting, the “New York Times” said.

These diplomats believed that if Mr Khrushchev was serious about his stated desire for peaceful coexistence, he might prepare at the Geneva meeting for a significant decision on disarmament at the summit

t MacArthur Unchanged.—The condition of General Douglas MacArthur was reported unchanged yesterday at Lenox Hill Hospital, where he has been undergoing treatment for a urological condition. Hospital officials reported earlier that the 80-year-old general was making normal improvement. —New York, February 15.