Main Achievement Is Seabed Treaty

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32394, 5 September 1970, Page 13

Main Achievement Is Seabed Treaty

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright) GENEVA, Sept. 4. The 25-nation Geneva disarmament conference adjourned last night until next year after adopting an 18page report to the United Nations General Assembly on its 1970 discussions.

Its main accomplishment has been to reach nearunanimous agreement on a much revised version of the joint Soviet-American draft treaty banning nuclear and other mass destruction weapons from the seabed and ocean floor. Only Mexico voiced objections to the final draft, and said it would seek alterations to the wording of some clauses at the forthcoming General Assembly session.

But little has been achieved since the 1970 session began

on February 17 to bridge wide East-West differences on this year’s other main topic, the outlawing of germ and gas weapons.

In a final speech to the conference today, the Soviet delegate, Mr Alexei Roshchin, said that conclusion of the seabed draft “testifies to the fact that we have real possibilities to find acceptab’ ■ solutions on complex problems in the field of cessation of the arms race and of disarmament.” Mr Roshchin described the conference’s discussions on chemical and biological weapons as useful and said that a better understanding of the positions of various States had been achieved. “However, we have to note also that there have appeared serious difficulties over the fact that some Western Powers do not show readiness to seek a solution simultaneously on the problem of chemical as well as biological weapons.”