Restriction By Nixon On Laos Report Claimed

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32221, 13 February 1970, Page 13

Restriction By Nixon On Laos Report Claimed

(N'.Z. Press Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, February 12. President Nixon was reported today to have refused to authorise the release of more than a heavily-censored version of testirriony to a Senate sub-committee on United States involvement in Laos.

Sources in the Administration and in Congress made known the President’s decision and 'said that it was in keepling with earlier statements that the United States was bombing the Ho Chi Minh trail in Laos but that further public discussion on activities in Laos would not be in the public interest. The sources said that Senator Stuart Symington (Demo

crat, Missouri), the sub-com-mittee’s chairman, refused to I issue such a watered-down; transcript because he felt it i would mislead the public on what the Government was doing in Laos. Thus, after three months of negotiation between the sub-committee and the Administration, the issue was reported deadlocked with no sign that it would soon be: resolved. The sources said that the Administration did not want: to release the transcript because it would reveal that the' United States had broken the Geneva Accords of 1962. These set Laotian neutrality; and prohibited outside Powers from sending armed: forces to Laos.

The Administration was, also said to fear that public! ' cation would damage a tenu |i ous negotiating effort with I the Soviet Union. The United States had been urging the*' Soviet Union to use its influ-1 ence to get North Vietnam toll withdraw its 50,000 troops I from Laos and to return top the 1962 accords. i The Soviet Union, accord-1 ing to sources in the State.

. Department, had indicated to the United States that it ' would neither put pressure I on the North Vietnamese nor I,escalate its support of North .(Vietnamese actions in Laos so long as the United States ' did not make a public issue II of the conflict there. • Officials who have seen the l transcript said that it gave a . detailed account of United States policy and action in i Laos, including many facts | not previously revealed to . the Senate. They said that the release of the transcript would divulge the cost of United States operations there,

casualties suffered, and the' nature of intelligence activity. Il might also prove embarrassing to the Royal Laos Government of the Prime Minister, Prince Souvanna Phouma. Senator Albert Gore (Democrat, Tennessee) told the Senate this week that he had access to the transcript and that the "evidence is ample that the war in Laos and United States participation has been secretly but greatly escalated.” Senator Gore, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee. said: “We are engaging now in a civil war in Laos, and we have chosen sides just as we did earlier in Vietnam.” He said: "What we are doing is getting more deeply involved in Laos while executing a gradual withdrawal from South Vietnam.” The senator said that the American people were en-

!titled to straight answers from their Government on what was happening there. He said: “We have increased our involvement and - our presence in Laos and the Government refuses publicly to admit it.” He asked: “What "goes on here?” The Symington sub-commit-tee, in accord with a Senate to investigate l American commitments "round the world, held its hearings on Laos last October. Senior officials from the military service, State Department, Central Intelligence ■ Agency and other departi ments testified. i .—.——