TRUSTEESHIP ISSUE

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 147, 23 June 1945, Page 7

TRUSTEESHIP ISSUE

MUTUAL COMPLIMENTS

(Official News Service.)

SAN FRANCISCO, June 21

Perhaps the most remarkable and most complete individual achievement of the United Nations Conference was brought before the public meeting of the commission dealing with the general assembly last night when the report of the committee of trusteeship, under the chairmanship of Mr. Fraser, was unanimously adopted.

The president of the commission, Field-Marshal Smuts, and several other delegates emphasised the unique nature of the task of the committee in that, unlike any other, it had no basic proposals on which to b.egin its deliberations.' There was no coverage of trusteeship in the Dumbarton Oaks proposals: instead, the committee was"required to work on the often widelydivergent, and sometimes conflicting, individual opinions of many nations. Fr<;m these it brought out a set of principles and the blueprint of supervisory machinery that have been received with universal agreement. The recognition that the interests and well-being of the dependent peoples are paramount and that the administration of them is to be regarded as a sacred trust is fhe theme that runs through the new chapter of the charter of the United Nations. Mr. Fraser described it as. being fundamentally the principle of "helping the native peoples to help themselves" in the fields of economic, social, political, and educational advancement. WARNING NOTE. Mr. Fraser felt it necessary to sound a note of caution —that the welfare and progress of dependent, peoples rested not so much on the, words of the new chapter as on the spirit in which the nations concerned must endeavour to translate them into reality. What his committee had set out to do was to build the road and point out the way which they hoped all nations with territories of every kind would follow. Not the least remarkable achievement of the committee, several delegates pointed out, has been the harmony and co-operation with which it has carried through its task. For this much credit went to Mr. Fraser personally, and tributes were paid by every speaker to his chairmanship, and, as the Netherlands delegate put it, to "his human understanding, and his idealistic, but eminently practical, leadership."

As president of the commission, Field-Marshal Smuts said he felt that a word of very high praise was due to Mr. Fraser. "His heart has been in this subject," he said. "He has worked very hard and I think much of the good work that has been done is due to the care and assiduity that he has devoted td it."

Field-Marshal Smuts', Mr. Fraser, and other speakers joined in warm tributes to Commander Stassen for his leadership and ability in the consultations among the representatives of the nations specially concerned with dependent territories. Mr. Fraser added that not the least important factor in the success of the work of the committee had been the willingness of all those nations whose interests were mostly directly involved to accept the guiding principles that had been embodied in the trusteeship chapter.