CONFERENCE ON LAOS

Press, Volume C, Issue 29702, 21 December 1961, Page 10

CONFERENCE ON LAOS

New Chinese Demand (N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) GENEVA, December 19. China insisted at the Laos peace conference yesterday that the South-east Asia Treaty Organisation withdraw its protective umbrella from Laos. The demand was raised by the Chinese delegate (Mr Chang Han-Fun) at the first plenary session the 14-nation group has held in five months. The meeting approved a draft treaty for peace and neutrality of a future Laos which leaves only two matters unsolved, said the Associated Press. One of these is the integration of the three Laotian armies, and the other is the issue of the S.E.A.T.O. the west's only defensive arrangements in Asia. SE.A.T.O., the Asian counterpart of NATO, combines Britain, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, France, the Philippines, Pakistan and Thailand. The Chinese delegate described the protective umbrella as "totally incompatible’’ with Laotian neutrality and a “most brutal trampling on the sovereignty” of Laos. The neutralist Prince, Souvanna Phouma, has called a meeting of the three Laotian Princes in Vientiane next Wednesday to discuss the formation of a coalition government. according to the New China News Agency. In a dispatch from Hanoi, the agency said the Prince cabled the proposal to the Boun Oum Government last Sunday.