Uneasiness Over Middle East

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29778, 22 March 1962, Page 13

Uneasiness Over Middle East

( N Z.P.A. -Reuter—Copyright) NEW YORK, March 21. United Nations Security Council members kept an uneasy eye on developments in the troubled Middle East today as they prepared for an early meeting on Syria’s charge of Israeli “aggression.”

The United Nations Secre-tary-General (U Thant) was kept informed of the situation by representatives on the spot of the United Nations Truce Supervisory Organisation iU.NT.SO.).

Israel complained to U.N T.S.O. last night about flights of Syrian jet aircraft over the Sea of Galilee, where Israeli and Syrian units clashed last week-end in the worst flare-up between Arabs and Israelis in recent years. Each side has accused the other of “aggression.” In the United Nations Israel countered Syria's charge with a plea of “self-defence ” The Syrian delegate Mr Farid Chehlaoui, in asking yesterday for the convening of a council meeting to consider the situation, said there was a “grave situation arising from the acts of aggression committed by Israel on the Syrian frontier and in the demilitarised zone.” The Council was not expected to meet on the question for a day or two, and possibly not before next week. It was meeting again today on Cuba's request tor a World Court ruling on the recent exclusion of the Castro regime from the inter-Ameri-can system, and this issue was expected to require another meeting tomorrow. The Middle East tension* were last debated by the Council just a year ago.