Iff™ ™T:I> or,. April-August 1961 V0f,9 6 Meeting No. kk 2U April ENGLISH UNITED NATIONS ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON THE CONGO Meeting at United Nations Headquarters, New York, on Monday, 2k April ±961, at 3,30 P»m. In the Chair: The Secretary-General MenSbers:- Canada I^r. HALSTEAD Ceylon . , , Mr. SUBASINGHE Ethiopia.,.. .... Mr. GEBRE-EGZY Federation of Malaya Mr. ZAKARIA Ghana . Mr. DADZIE Guinea a ... r..,j,._.., ,,. India., ,_-,•. ._. ,- Mr. JHA Indonesia :; , / ,... Ireland . 'Mr. KENNEDY Liberia ,, . Mr. JOHNSON ' Mali i: ,,.-.. .. ..: - . Mr. LY .Morocco . ; Mr. BEN ABOUD Nigeria ... • , Mr. WACHUKU Pakistan .. • / : Mr. HASAN Senegal Itoe KLEINSMIDT Sudan Mr, ADEEL Sweden . Mrs. ROSSEL Tunisia Mr. SLIM ' United Arab Republic Mr. RIAD 61-11687 BKS/bg The SECRETARY-GENERAL: The meeting is called to order. The subject of our meeting today is the result of the negotiations of the two delegates we have had in Leopoldville and in other parts of the Congo in order to prepare the ground for the effective implementation of A-2 and B-2 of tlie Gecurity Council resolution of 21 February. They had long and difficult negotiations for reasons explained in their memorandum* I wish on this occasion, first of all, to thank them — and I know I can speak for all of you -- for the very diligent and intelligent work which they have undertaken and carried through. The report is before you along with the result. The result is, of course, .1 what we must look at in particular. You will have gathered that the situation as regards the so-called agreement is the somewhat unusual one that while the other party, that is to say, the Congoleee authorities, is bound by their initialling of the paper and while, on the other hand, the negotiators on our side, are bound by their initialling, in view of the necessity for me to consult with you, the right of the Secretary-General to give his final approval or to re-open the question has been left open; that is to say/ the situation you are facing is not one in which this need be the last word, from the point of view of the United Nations. 'We have in this way reserved your right to express opinions. On the other hand, of course, we should not fool ourselves. The moment there is mutual initialling of this kind, it involves certain moral obligations, which all of us, of course, wish to take fully into account. In any event, whatever those moral obligations are and whatever our feelings for them may be, we have seen to it that this Advisory Committee is in a situation where it is free to give advice and to expect the advice to be seriously considered and heeded. With those words explaining the quasi-legal situation, I would invite the negotiators to give their own comments and also to reply to such questions as you might wish to put. NR/dp 5 (The Secretary-General) ' I should like to add that it would be my .hope that Mi-. Gardiner could go back to Leopoldville tomorrow night to get started on practical action in implementation of the agreement. I think it is highly essential to put meat on these somewhat bare bones and to test out the seriousness of the intentions stated'from the Congolese side in practical action* We cannot then leave them - in a situation where they would say that there is no follow-up because there is no response from our side. We must, on the practical side, show both . • ability and willingness to do everything that is expected of us to render possible an implementation of those clauses. We have not been able to do so while the matter was pending here, because as a matter of course every action • by way of implementation is also by implication an approval from here of the agreement itself, and I have therefore had to wait with such steps towards implementation until we had this meeting. You know very well why it has not been possible to have this meeting before today, and for that reason I have made no excuse for it. 'However, it is essential that we try to get as far as we can today — if possible, to the point where it will be appropriate for Mr. Gardiner to return tomorrow. ^ I would ask either Mr. Nwokedi or Mr. Gardiner to speak. Mr* KWOKEDI; Mr. Secretary-General, we thank you for your kind remarks. In presenting our recommendations as contained in the report, Mr. Gardiner and I thought'it would be helpful if we explained briefly the background of some of our concluding remarks. During our discussions with the four governmental groups in Leopoldville, Bakwanga, Stanleyville and Elisabethville, we found that, with the exception of Katanga, all the Congolese authorities showed a readiness to implement the resolution of 21 February of the Security Council, The Leopoldville authorities, however, adopted a more cautious attitude, partly because of fears that implementation of the resolution would disrupt their services and partly because of the stand they had taken at Tananarive, where they had declared the resolution unacceptable. To some extent, this view also prevailed in Bakwanga, where Mr. Kalonj'i assured us that the problem of foreign elements in his army would be KR/dp (Mr. Nvokedi) solved upon the return of his thirty-one Baluba cadets now studying in Europe. The Stanleyville authorities welcomed the resolution but made a reservation in regard to the reorganization of the Congolese National Army. In their view, nothing should be done about reorganizleg the Army until Parliament had reassentled and vested authority in a central Government that could then be charged with the responsibility of implementing the resolution. In Katanga we met with a bland refusal to implement the resolution. These different attitudes are dealt with, as you will have seen, in paragraphs 11 to 2? of the report. The next point in the report — I refer to paragraphs 28 and 29 — is the relations between the Congolese authorities and the United Nations. There seems to be a growing svareness among the Congolese that the initiative in the solution of the problem of the Congo should rest with them." Coupled with this is the increasing confidence in their ability to handle their own affairs with little or no external interference. So, while expressing appreciation for foreign aid -- especially assistance from the United Nations — they voiced with some emphasis their determination to have the final say with regard to the manner in which such aid was given. The Security Council resolutioV n of 21 February had been distorted and interpreted as an attempt by the United Nations against the sovereignty of the Republic. There was a feeling that the United Nations was trying to impose its will on them and that it adopted towards them attitudes different from those towards any other Member State with which the United Nations was engaged in an operation of assistance rather than conflict. In this atmosphere of distrust and misunderstanding, rumours about the United Nations intention to disarm the ANC readily gained credence and aroused genuine alarm among the soldiers and politicians, who consequently adopted in public a posture of defiance towards the United Nations. In combatting the aforementioned attitudes, Mr. Gardiner and I found it necessary to explain the Security Council resolution of 21 February in detail and to reassure the Congolese authorities that the object of the resolution was to assist the Congo to rid itself of undesirable and harmful elements and to rebuild the Army into a united force loyal to the Republic as a whole. NR/dp 5 (Mr, Nwokedl) Now, turning to the text of the agreement, in paragraph 65 of the report, you will find that, on the one hand, we have restated the position of the Congo in regard to the United Nations in a manner which should remove any grounds for further fears by the Congolese authorities that their sovereignty is being infringed. On the other hand, the President of the Republic has now dispelled all doubts arising from the Tananarive conference as to his willingness to co-operate fully with the United Nations in the implementation of the resolution. The agreement contains the basic principles for future action and, in particular, the broad lines along which the United Nations is expected to assist in the implementation of the resolution. r HS/Kitn 6 (Mr, Rvokedl) In our opinion these principles constitute the basis of the next stage in bringing about the withdrawal of all the foreign personnel concerned, and the reorganization of the army. Vie consider that this next stage should be embarked upon without delay, and our recommendations, as you will have noticed, are in two parts. Paragraph 68 deals with the civil service, and paragraph 69 with the armed forces. With regard to the former, you will notice that we have recommended that a United Nations expert should visit the Congo without delay to discuss with the President the quickest way of withdrawing and evacuating all political advisers concerned. The expert, in our opinion, will assist in organizing the transfer of some United Nations personnel now in the Congo to the Congolese ministries, to replace the displaced foreign personnel and strengthen the administration. He will at the same time assist the President in setting up a machinery, possibly a public service commission as operated in certain countries, for the recruitment of additional personnel for the Congolese civil service. We also feel that he should discuss with the President such additional facilities for the training of Congolese administrative and technical cadre as ma*• y be required, V/ith regard to the armed forces, we have recommended that a military expert and such other officers as may be required should be made available to the President of the Republic, to assist in the implementation of those parts of the resolution dealing with the withdrawal and evacuation from the Congo of Belgian and other military and para-military personnel and mercenaries, and the reorganization of the armed units.