United Nations FIRST COMMITTEE, 1122nd GENERAL MEETING Tuesday, 6 December 1960, ASSEMBLY at 10.55 a.m. FIFTEENTH SESSION Official Records NEW YORK CONTENTS the Assembly's thirteenth session, referring to the Page right of the Algerian people to independence and to the Agenda item 71: willingness of the Provisional Government of the Question of Algeria (continued) Algerian Republic to enter into negotiations with the General debate (continued). • . • • • . • • • • • 211 French Government, and urging the parties to reach a negotiated settlement of the Algerian conflict. 3. At the fourteenth session, the Assembly had set Chairman: Sir Claude CO REA (Ceylon). aside in plenary session a draft resolution (A/C.1/ L.246 and Add.1) approved in the First Committee by a majority vote, in favour of a more moderate text AGENDA ITEM 71 (A/L.276) recognizing the right of the Algerianpeople to self-determination and, with a view to reaching a peaceful solution on the basis of that right and in Question of Algeria (A! 4418 and Add.l) (continued) accordance with the principles of the Charter of the GENERAL DEBATE (continued) United Nations, urging the parties concerned to enter into "pourparlers". However, even that mild resolu­ 1. Mr. SHUKArnY (Saudi Arabia) said that the inter­ tion had not been adopted. national character of the Algerian question and the competence of the United Nations to deal with it had 4. The circumstances of its defeathadbeenrevealing long been established facts. Although the absence of and unprecedented. In essence, the draft resolution France from the Committee was to be regretted, it which the Assembly had been asked to adopt had must not shake the determination of the United Nations, merely reaffirmed a basic principle of the Charter and as an international organization dedicated to the restated the policy proclaimed by the President ofthe maintenance of peace and the promotion of fundamental French Republic, General de Gaulle, on 16 September freedoms and human rights, to discharge its obliga­ 1959. It had not condemned France, nor had it con­ tions with respect to Algeria. tained any derogatory reference to French policy in Algeria. It should have been adopted by acclamation; 2. Reviewing the history of the Algerian question in indeed, each of its paragraphs, put to the vote the United Nations, he said that it had been Saudi separately, had obtained the required two-thirds Arabia which on 5 January 1955-early in the Algerian majority. Yet the resolution as a whole had been re­ war-had drawn the attention of the Security Council jected. Shortly after the voting, the French delegation to the grave situation created by France's attempt had asserted that the resolution had been defeated as to put down the national uprising in Algeria by force a result of strategy and collaboration between France of arms. The Security Council had taken no action. and a group of the friends of France. But it was un­ Later in the same month, the efforts of fourteen justifiable for a Member State to employ strategy in African and Asian States to have the Algerian question order to defeat a resolution on a serious international discussed by the General Assembly at its tenth session problem. By killing the resolution, the Western had been frustrated. In 1956, the Security Council's Powers, which had argued with one voice throughout attention had again on two occasions been drawn by the debate, had dealt a severe blow to freedom. the African and Asian States to the deteriorating situation in Algeria. The Council had refused to con­ 5. The case for Algeria, as presented by the African sider it. In October 1956, at the request of the same and Asian delegations to the First Committee at the group of States, the question had been placed on the Assembly's fourteenth session, had been based on agenda of the General Assembly at its eleventh session. President de Gaulle's statement of 16 September 1959, After full debate, the Assembly had unanimously in which he had recognized the right of the people of adopted resolution 1012 (XI) expressing the hope that, Algeria to self-determination. Although that state­ in a spirit of co-operation, a peaceful, democratic and ment had contained dangerous loopholes, the Pro­ just solution would be found, through appropriate visional Government of Algeria had welcomed it and means, in conformity with the principles of the United had declared itself ready to negotiate with France the Nations Charter. France had disregarded that resolu­ conditions and guarantees, including a cease-fire, tion and the war in Algeria had continued. Resolu­ necessary to enable the Algerians to decide their tion 1184 (XII), which had also been adopted future status. The Provisior.al Government had not in­ unanimously, had similarly been ignored by France; sisted on immediate independence; it had not pressed in that resolution the Assembly, at its twelfth session, for recognition; it had not suggested any particular had taken note of the offer of good offices made by r~gime, order or constitution for Algeria. On the the King of Morocco and the President of Tunisia and contrary, it had accepted President de Gaulle's pro­ had expressed the wish that "pourparlers 11 should be posal that the people of Algeria should be offered a entered into by the parties. Finally, Francehadshown free choice between independence, integration with the same attitude with regard to the draft resolu­ France and association with France, and had declared tion (A/C.1/L.232) submitted by seventeen Powers at that it would be bound by the Algerian people's deci- 211 A/C.1/SR.l122 212 General Assembly- Fifteenth Session- First Committee sion. It had insisted only that that decision should be part of the French contribution to the "common de­ made under conditions which would ensure that it was fence". Indeed, in applying to the United States entirely free. Government for financial aid, the French had strongly 6. The case for France, on the other hand, had been emphasized the financial implications of the war in presented to the First Committee, in the absence of the Algeria. The financial support given to France by French delegation, by the Western Powers. For the NATO provided further confirmation of its major past six sessions of the Assembly, France had responsibility in the Algerian war. wavered between denying or acknowledging the com­ 8. The war in Algeria could be said to be NATO's petence of the United Nations to deal with the Algerian only achievement, since all its plans for Western question. France should be reminded that what Presi­ military defence and economic co-operation had dent de Gaulle had referred to as the "so-called been a failure. In fact, France regarded NATO United Nations" included France, and, moreover, that primarily as a means of maintaining its position in France was a permanent member of the Security Algeria, and had repeatedly warned the NATO Powers Council. If, as President de Gaulle held, the United that continued French rule in Algeria was essential Nations had failed in many respects, one of the main to continued French membership in NATO. reasons for at least some of its failures was France's refusal to comply with its decisions, in particular, on 9. NATO members were expected to place their the question of Algeria. France's strategy at the loyalty to that organization above their loyalty to the fourteenth session had been deplorable. One after United Nations; in 1955, after Greece and Iceland had another, the Western Powers which supported France voted for the inclusion of the Algerian question in the had pleaded with the Assembly to give France time to agenda of the General Assembly, Mr. Spaak, the implement its policy of self-determination, not to Secretary-General of NATO, had in effect rebuked antagonize it or to offend its sensibilities, and to them by stating that NATO members must co­ refrain from taking any precipitate action which might ordinate their foreign policies. The enforcement of disturb the balance of the delicate situation created that policy on NATO members was a direct threat to by President de Gaulle's statement of 16 September the United Nations. 1959. In point of fact, the North Atlantic Treaty 10. Although NATO's professed purpose was the Organization (NATO) Powers had misled the United defence of freedom and democracy, the aggressive Nations into a policy of inaction but for which the war which it was waging in Algeria showed that it was year 1960 could have been Algeria's year of peace. actually a champion of colonialism and an enemy of Because the United Nations had renounced its re­ freedom. That was why the Algerian Provisional sponsibility for the maintenance of peace, the war in Government had recently denounced Algeria's inclu­ Algeria had entered its seventh year and continued sion in the area covered by NATO and repudiated all unabated, taking a heavy toll of human lives and engagements undertaken by France in the name of creating serious economic and political difficulties Algeria, and had warned the NATO Powers that it for France. If they were really concerned for the regarded all participation by NATO or its members in future of France, the friends of France should exert the Algerian war as an act of aggression against the every effort to end that devastating war. Algerian people. 7. While the NATO Powers had advocated a policy 11. It was not because of any bias that he was in­ of inaction in the United Nations, outside the Organiza­ troducing the issue of NATO into the Algerian ques­ tion they had extended every form of assistance to tion, but because a peaceful solution of the Algerian France to enable it to carry on its colonial war in war would be impossible so long as NATO gave Algeria.