Reassurances on detente wanted by Kremlin

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33673, 24 October 1974, Page 17

Reassurances on detente wanted by Kremlin

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copy right> MOSCOW, October 23. The United States Secretary of State (Dr Henry Kissinger) will arrive in Moscow today for a four-day visit amid Soviet hopes that he will confirm the Ford Administration’s intention to continue the policy of detente with Moscow pursued under President Nixon. All the signs from Washington are that Dr Kissinger will seek to establish a new framework for the idling Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (S.A.L.T.) aimed at controlling the two countries’ huge nuclear arsenals. But Western diplomats in Moscow say that the Kremlin is more interested in satisfying itself that U.S.-Soviet relations will follow the general course of co-operation they took during the Nixon Presidency, when Dr Kissinger first emerged on the world scene.

The Secretary of State will fly into Moscow from Washington on the first leg of an international tour which will take him to Asia, Europe and —it has been suggested—on to the Middle East. While in the Soviet capital, he will technically be the guest of the Foreign Minister (Mr Andrei Gromyko), but his stay is certain to centre on talks with the party leader, Mr Leonid Brezhnev. Dr Kissinger’s visit has so far received little direct attention from the Soviet media, beyond a short announcement that it would take place.

But an article in the Government newspaper, “Izvestia,” yesterday, presented him as a guarantor that detente would advance under President Ford, some of whose foreign policy statements have caused unease among the Soviet leadership.

: The article by “Izvestia’s” , New York correspondent, V. ■ Kobysh, remarked that in a r speech before the Senate : Foreign Affairs Committee, 5 “H. Kissinger noted that the ■ relaxation of tension in rela- ; tions with the Soviet Union . remains one of the main aims

of the foreign policy of the U.S.A.” “For the inhabitants of the United States, and for the world outside, the speech of H. Kissinger looked like one more testimony of the readiness of the new Government of the U.S.A. to take the course of detente,” “Izvestia” said.

Meanwhile, a senior Politburo member, Mr Mikhail Suslov, stated at a rally in Tashkent yesterday that detente with the West—which for Russia means economic co-operation as well as peace, ful co-existence—was the cornerstone of Soviet foreign policy. Dr Kissinger’s standing as a champion of detente is likely to be increased by his role in last week’s agreement under which Moscow is expected to win the export benefits of most-favoured nation trading status, in return for allowing more Soviet Jews to emigrate. But observers feel that his efforts to speed up the S.A.L.T. talks, with their complex equations of missile numbers and destructiveness, could be headed off as the Soviet Union works on developing sophisticated multi-warhead weapons. Observers think that a new accord must wait at least until Mr Brezhnev has met Mr Ford for the first time. Arranging such a meeting—probably at the end of next month—is likely to be a major purpose of Dr Kissinger’s visit. The Secretary of State could run into further problems in trying to win Kremlin approval for his strategy in the Middle East, which is also expected to figure on the agenda of his talks. Dr Kissinger is aiming at further partial steps towards an over-all settlement, but Mr Brezhnev warned recently that a full agreement, through a reconvened Geneva conference, was needed quickly. He also called for the creation of a Palestinian homeland. Prudent eaters Low-income Israeli families are eating more nutritious foods- than those with higher incomes, according to a study by the National Institute. “Poorer people seem to have an instinct for buying the most nutritious kinds of food with their money,” the report says. — Jerusalem, October 23.