N.Z. votes on South Africa’s position in U.N.

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33654, 2 October 1974, Page 1

N.Z. votes on South Africa’s position in U.N.

(By 1

BRUCE KOHN,

N.Z.P.A. staff correspondent)

WASHINGTON, October 1. New Zealand yesterday voted to have the Security Council review South Africa’s membership of the United Nations.

She was one of 125 nations in favour of such a move, only South Africa herself voting against it and nine countries, including the United Kingdom, France, and the United States, abstaining.

The New Zealand Ambassador to the United Nations (Mr Malcolm Templeton) said that solemn warnings given South Africa to abandon her racial policies had not been heeded. The move, therefore, had New Zealand’s full support.

Australia “will probably” vote to put South Africa out of the United Nations, said the Australian Prime Minister (Mr Whitlam) today, after he had heard yesterday’s debate. "South Africa has constantly defied United Nations rulings,” Mr Whitlam said. The vote Mr Whitlam was referring to will not come up until the Security Council meets again, which is not expected for several months. Yesterday’s vote authorising the Security Countil review came after some four hours of debate in the General .Assembly initiated by a refusal of the United Nations credentials committee to endorse South Africa’s membership credentials.

I After several procedural | tangles in which the African 'national grouping, some 40 strong, spoke out against South Africa’s policies of apartheid, the General Assembly decided, by 98 votes to 23, to reject South Africa’s credentials. A total of 14 nations, including New Zealand, abstained. New Zealand had abstained because a negative vote could have been miscontinued, said the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Tizard) in a statement in Welington today. “The New Zealand Government considered that an abstention was the appropriate decision to take,” Mr Tizard said. “We abstained on the same issue at the 1973 General Assembly session.” “Past presidential rulings in the General Assembly have established that such a nonacceptance has the effect of giving a strong moral rebuke to the Government of South Africa,” Mr Tizard said. Over-all view Diplomatic sources at the United Nations said the over-all view within the organisation seems to be that South Afri should not be expelled. “Moderate" African nations want South Africa to be able to continue membership so that they can retain the United Nations as a forum in which to keep pressure on South Africa to moderate its racial policies. They have

accepted the view — taken by New Zealand — that should South Africa be expelled, the United Nations will no longer be able to criticise her failure to live up to the obligations of membership, the sources say. It seems, therefore, that it is unlikely that the. Security Council wil press for South Africa’s expulsion, but may take steps to step up pressures for the abandonment of apartheid. U.N. developments, Page 17