Thant Warns On Funds For Cyprus Force

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30914, 22 November 1965, Page 16

Thant Warns On Funds For Cyprus Force

(N.Z.P.A. Reuter —Copyright >

NEW YORK, Nov. 21.

U Thant, the Secretary-General, informed the Security Council yesterday that the United Nations peace-keeping force in Cyprus might have to be withdrawn unless its “serious deficit condition” were corrected.

He said there was a gap of about 6,900,000 dollars between estimated costs of the operation in the 21month period from its inception to the expiration date of the present mandate, December 26 next, and the sums paid or pledged.

While he had again appealed to all member Governments and those nonmembers which had previously helped for further contributions, he had no reason to believe that this gap would be substantially narrowed, he said. "Thus, I must now call directly and formally to the attention of the council the hard and urgent fact that Unficyp (the acronym of the force) cannot be maintained in Cyprus without the financial means to defray its costs,” U Thant said in his written report. Yet, by all present reckoning, it appeared there would be a continuing need and demand for a U.N. force in the island beyond December 26. he said.

The financial deficiency assumed an “especially serious significance” in light of the fact that the council within a few weeks must decide on the future of the force.