Namibia talks threatened by seating row

Press, 9 January 1981, Page 6

Namibia talks threatened by seating row

NZPA-Reuter Geneva Tai’ s to set a date for a cease-fire and independence for the disputed territory of Namibia (Sou’h-West Africa) were due to get under way late yesterday, providing a row over seating arrangements is settled. The United Nations Secre-tary-General (Dr Kurt Waldheim) told reporters he hoped to settle the dispute in time for working talks to start late last night (N.Z. time). The week-long conference was formally opened at the Palais Des Nations in Geneva yesterday. The procedural hitch, which caused a postponement of substantive discussions, is over de ands by Namibia’s ruling multi-racial Democratic Turnhalle Alliance for equal status with the South-West Africa People’s Organisation (5.W.A.P.0.).

S.W.A.P.O. has been waging guerrilla warfare in the

territory for the last 15 years and is recognised by the United Nations as the principal partner along With South Africa in the dialogue. South Africa has ruled the vast territory, a former German colony inhabited by one million people, for 60 years — for the last 37 years in defiance of international attempts to bring it to indement. A South African diplomat told reporters it must be made clear that the existing Namibian ruling parties were taking par‘ in the talks on an equal basis with S.W.A.P.O. and were not to be described as puppets of the South African Governor nt. At the- opening ceremony they-'fornred part of a combined South African and Namibian team. Black D.T.A. leaders' have bitterly complained to reporters about the United Nations’s recognition of S.W.A.P.O. as representative

|of the Namibian people. [They said it would not win power in a free and fair election. Addressing the formal opening, with S.W.A.P.O. and South African delegates facing each other across the marbled old League of Nations Council chamber, Dr Waldheim appealed for reconciliation in the territory and an end to bloodshed. The United Nations chief, who announced that he was staying on several days to help the conference get off to a good start, said he hoped a date would be set by next week for a ceasefire and a timetable for independence bv the end of 1981. Leaders of S.W.A.P.O. and diplomats from black African States mingled with delegates from South Africa at an introductory cocktail party arranged by the United Nations. South African observers described it as a unique get-together.