Young resignation deals fresh blow to Carter

Press, 17 August 1979, Page 6

Young resignation deals fresh blow to Carter

(NZPA-Reuter Washington The resignation of the controversial United States Ambassador to the United Nations (Mr Andrew Young) dealt a fresh blow yesterday to the sagging fortunes of President Carter.

Mr Young, the first black ito head the United States mission to the United | Nations, is a close friend of the President and the reaction of White House officials : demonstrated the loyalty Mr Carter felt for his envoy. The resignation came after ,Mr Young admitted not telling the whole truth about an I unauthorised meeting with the Palestine Liberation Origanisation. I The White House Press I Secretary (Mr Jody Powell) wept and choked with emotion while reading the President’s letter accepting Mr Young’s resignation. The show of emotion from the normally imperturbable Mr Powell so stunned journalists that they let him leave the news conference without asking him any questions.

' Political commentators 'viewed the issue as a i serious blow to the Presi- | dent’s foreign policy and Mr I Young’s departure sent 'shock waves through the • United Nations headquarters. There have already been Arab charges that Mr Young I was a victim of Tsraelij Zionist blackmail.” I At home, President Carter, struggling to improve his 'image for the 1980 elections, could lose votes from black I communities where Mr Young drummed up solid support last time. The row erupted only a

month after Mr Carter admitted that his leadership image had been tarnished, reshuffled his Cabinet, and opened a vigorous campaign to overcome his plunging popularity. Mr Carter’s decision to accept his friend’s resignation was linked to his campaign promise that if a member of his Cabinet ever lied “he will be looking for a new job before the sun comes up in the morning.” Mr Young, who is 47, has been a controversial figure since he became the head of the United States mission at the United Nations 2| years ago. The latest incident blew up over an unauthorised meeting on July 26 with a P.L.O. representative at the United Nations, Zehdi Terzi. Initially, Mr Young said nothing of substance was discussed and that the meeting had occurred by chance. But after Israel protested the State Department said Mr Young had changed his story. The department said he knew he would meet Mr Terzi and discuss delaying an . important United Nations debate on the Palestinian question. Mr Young told a press ference on Wednesday that he “didn’t lie,” but acknowledged he “didn’t tell the whole truth.” The meeting could not

have come at a worse time since United States-Israeli relations are at one of their low points. It fuelled Israeli suspicions of a shift in United States policy towards the Arabs because of oil needs — a charge Washington denies. At the United Nation headquarters there was much resentment over the circumstances in which Mr Young decided to step down and the P.O.L. representative, Mr Terzi, told reporters the United States had given in to “Israeli-Zionist blackmail.” One Gulf State delegate said: “Mr Young got himself into controversies .much bigger than this one and survived. If what has happened now proves anything it is the strength of the IsraeliZionist lobby.” More than one Arab diplomat remarked on the irony that among the Arabs Mr Young was never considered to have been sympathetic towards their cause but to have tilted towards the Israeli side. Mr Young himself has said that the financial support the civil-rights movement in the American south received from Jewish businessmen influenced his attitudes. Mr Carter once said Mr Young was the finest public figure he had ever met. The

“Wall Street Journal,” however, said Mr Young suffered from “foot-in-mouth” disease, and the President had to call him to order several times. The envoy was credited with improving the climate of American relations with African and Latin American States. In rapid succession he managed to upset conservative Americans, Swedes, and South Africans, and the British. Among Mr Young’s most controversial remarks was his accusation that Britain had “almost invented racism.” He later sent a written apology saying he had been unfair. Hardly had that flap died down when Mr Young was rebuked by the State Department for drawling “yeah” when asked whether he thought South Africa’s apartheid Government was “illegitimate.” He caused stirs at home by saying that Cubans in Africa were a “stabilising influence” and by asserting there were “hundreds, maybe thousands of political prisoners” in American jails. During the Iranian crisis he won headlines by saying that the religious leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeiny, “will be some king or a saint when we finally get over the panic of what is happening there.”