Kennedy Hopeful On Soviet Relations

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29851, 18 June 1962, Page 15

Kennedy Hopeful On Soviet Relations

(N.Z.P a.. -Reuter—Copyright)

WASHINGTON, June 11

President Kennedy said vesterdav that if the Laos agreement could he made 'to work it would be an encouraging step forward to more amicable relations between the Soviet L mon and the United States.

“We can then discuss other problems,” he told a press conference. He also said that tbtre was nothing on “a summit as yet.”

The President's hopeful remarks about relations with the Soviet Union came in response tp a question as to whether the formula on Laos —involving the formation of a neutralist coalition government representing all political factions—was in any way applicable to divided Berlin or Germany. He said he did not see a parallel and commented that the situation in Berlin obviously was different from that in Laos. But, if the Laos agreement could be made to work, “it would encourage us to believe that there has been a change in atmosphere and that other problems also could be subjected to reason and solution.

'That is why I regard the Laos matter as so important. We have to wait now and see whether we can make this agreement . . . work.” At another point the President emphasised the United States search for an end to the arms race and for a solution in Berlin and SouthEast Asia. He said: “I am confident that if there is goodwill on both sides there can be a lessening of tension. But there has to be goodwill on both sides.” On other foreign policy matters, the President reacted sharply to the recent action in Congress of curbing aid and trade to Poland and Jugoslavia. He said that the L nited States Ambassadors to both countries regarded thi» action as “a major setback and a great asset to Moscow. "I don't think we should do those favours to them (the Russians) if we can help it.” he said. The President's cautiously

optimistic remarks about possibly improved relations with the Soviet Union came amid a welter of questions which served to emphasise the President’s economic problems at home, spearheaded bv the slump on the Wall ’street stock market. He hammered home the point which he emphasised in his speech at Yale University last Monday—that it was necessary for the country to examine the “very complicated” economy and to try to adjust economic methods to modern requirements. Regarding his Yale statement that Budget deficits were not necessarily inflationary or harmful, the President emphasised that the key word was “necessarily.” Recalling that there had been recessions in 1958 and in 1960—under a Republican Administration President Kennedy said the United States, which was the source of strength for the non-Com-mumst world, did not want to run into periods of recurrent recessions.

He called for a spirit of non-partisanship in considering the economic issues he had raised and said it was important that business, the Government and every group recognised the necessity of attempting to work out an economic policy which would maintain the economy at an adequate rate of growth. “That is the great problem for us,” he said.