TRIAL UNDERGROUND TEST BAN ADVOCATED

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31097, 28 June 1966, Page 17

TRIAL UNDERGROUND TEST BAN ADVOCATED

(N.Z.P.A. Reuter —Copyright)

TORONTO, June 27. A high-level but non-governmental conference on problems of preventing the spread of nuclear weapons concluded in Toronto yesterday with a communique urging a halt in underground nuclear tests for a limited trial period.

The communique, is- | 1 sued after a four-day meeting of delegates from 26 countries, suggested all military powers should stop underground tests •while earth tremors were checked through a system of challenge and invitation. If the tremors could not be established as natural phenomena, the Government

of the country where they originated would be requested to supply explanatory data.

The communique, described as generally acceptable to all participants, who included representatives of the United States, the Soviet Union and Britain, also made a strong plea for a treaty limiting the proliferation of nuclear weapons. “In certain troubled areas, such as Europe, the Kiddle East and Asia, the acquisition of nuclear weapons by

opposing powers might indefinitely postpone the prospects of political settlements,” it said. The communique said a non-proliferation treaty would have to be signed by all nations having any r-.clear capability whether for civil or military purposes. The best treaty would be one signed by all existing military nuclear powers under which all other powers would undertake not to manufacture or acquire nuclear weapons, it said.

The delegates, many of them high-ranking government officials, were invited to the conference as individuals and did not attend as representatives of their governments. The United States group, with 13 members, was the largest. Britain had six delegates, Canada five, India and Sweden four, the Soviet Union and Japan three and the remaining countries one or two. Lord Chalfont, the British Minister for Disarmament, was in the British delegation, and Mr Adrian S. Fisher, deputy director of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, was among the American group.

Wool Steady.—Prices at the Brisbane wool sales today were generally unchanged compared with the Sydney closing rates last Thursday. Compared with the Brisbane closing levels on May 26 values were in buyers’ favour except for weak-stapled wools, which were irregular.—Brisbane, June 27.