Russian Delegate Calls For Withdrawal Of All Foreign Troops In Korea

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27569, 11 December 1950, Page 5

Russian Delegate Calls For Withdrawal Of All Foreign Troops In Korea

New Zealand Press Association —Copyright Rec. 9.10 p.m. NEW YORK, Dec. 9. The Soviet Foreign Minister, Mr Andrei Vyshinsky, submitted a resolution today asking the United Nations General Assembly to recommend that: 1. All foreign troops in Korea be immediately withdrawn. 2. The solution of the Korean question be vested in the Korean* people themselves. He said this was the only way in which peace could be restored.

Before he moved the resolution, Mr Vyshinsky branded as nonsense estimates by the United 'States and the United Nations Commission of the strength of the Chinese Communist forces in Korea. ?

The commission reported yesterday that Chinese forces definitely identified totalled 231,000 men, and one responsible estimate placed the total at 400,000. Mr Vyshinsky referred to these figures and to details of the Chinese divisions said by the United States delegate, Mr Warren Austin, to have been identified in Korea. Mr Vyshinsky resumed the debate on the six-Power resolution calling for the withdrawal of the Chinese

forces and assuring the Peking Government that the United Nations would not violate the Manchurian border. Mr- Vyshinsky maintained that the Chinese troops in Korea were volunteers and it was. “ legitimate and natural” that they bore the same weapons “ as that army in whose ranks they had joined.” He said volunteers did not have to be a horde. They could be put together in military-type units. Mr Vyshinsky added that the United Nations Commission’s figures were designed to bolster the thesis of the supporters of the six-Power resolution and were not worthy of reliance, credence or attention.

Mr Vyshinsky had earlier accused the United States and Britain of “ turning facts upside down ” in attempts to prove that North Korea began the aggression. He said: “ Documents, evidence and facts expose this lie.” The Chinese interventionists, he maintained, were within the existing principles of the international law which allowed “ private persons ’’ from a neutral country to cross into the territory of a belligerent Power. Appeal for Arms

The South Korean Foreign Minister, Mr Ben Limb, urged the world’s free nations to send more arms to the Korean battlefield to defeat the Communist hordes. “To surrender now would be ironic mockery," he said. The people of Korea had not lost hope; they would fight on to the end. M. Fernand Van Langenhove, of Belgium, said the Soviet’s new technique—that of domination and a technique with strategic reserves called volunteers—contained a threat to peace which was not confined to the Far East. It covered the whole world and was the concern of all free nations, and the employment of prudent counter-measures was essential. Peking Reassured Mr Kenneth Younger, British Minister of State, reassured the Peking Government yesterday that its interests would be respected in any Korean settlement. He told the United Nations Political Committee: “If they will stop the killing and put themselyes within the pale of the Charter’s principles there is no reason why the way should not be open to a period of free co-operation between China and the nations both of the East and the West who are represented around this table. “The Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China is faced with ah historic decision. The choice it nof/ makes will determine whether future generations will curse or bless its name. It must be under no illusion about the grim prospect which opens out for it and for all of us if it chooses wrongly.”. Equally, said Mr Younger, the Chinese should know “ that we in the United Nations will neither do in act or speak a word which will make it difficult for them to choose aright.” Mr Younger added: "It is certain that the peoples of our countries want nothing more ardently than to live in peace with China and to share with her the task of setting this distracted world on its feet.”