501.BB/12–846
Memorandum of Conversation, by G. Hayden Raynor of the United States Delegation Staff of Advisers
Dr. van Royen77 told me in greatest confidence this noon that Belgium wished to resign its seat on the Economic and Social Council in order to enable the Netherlands to have, a place on this Council. He asked me if I would check with our charter constitutional experts in an effort to ascertain whether or not in their opinion there was any way this could be accomplished without opening the whole matter up to new elections which might conceivably develop in neither Belgium nor the Netherlands being on the Council.
After checking with our experts I informed Dr. van Royen that as we saw it Rule 88 which called for a by-election was the only rule applicable and that therefore as much as we would like to see the solution worked out, we were unable to select the method which would avoid the risk mentioned above. He then told me that the latest thinking in the Belgian and Dutch Delegations on the subject was to put the matter up frankly to the Assembly asking for a vote on a hypothetical basis as to whether if Belgium resigned the Assembly would elect the Netherlands. This is not a final decision and is subject to further consideration between the Belgian and Netherlands Delegations.78
- Dr. J. H. van Roijen, Representative on the Netherlands Delegation.↩
- After two ballots on December 7 Byelorussia was elected to ECOSOC. This had the result of narrowing the field to the Netherlands and Turkey, and after two more ballots at the same meeting had failed to effect an election the President of the Assembly declared the voting postponed to a later time (GA(I/2), Plenary, pp. 998–1006, passim. When the balloting was resumed on December 12 there followed a complicated parliamentary situation, which may be traced ibid., pp. 1222–1231. This in turn resulted in the withdrawal of Belgium from its ECOSOC seat, then the election of Turkey and the Netherlands in that order.↩