Editorial Note
At its 244th, 245th, and 246th Meetings, November 17 and 18, (GA (IV), Plenary, pages 225–264), the United Nations General Assembly took up the Greek question in plenary session. The positions of the delegations expressed earlier in the First Committee meetings (see the editorial note, page 451) were restated. For the text of the speech by the United States Alternate Representative, Benjamin V. Cohen, to the 244th Plenary Meeting of the Assembly, setting forth the position of the United States on the Greek question, see Department of State Bulletin, November 29, 1949, pages 813–816, or A Decade of American Foreign Policy, 1941–49, pages 774–779. At its 246th Meeting the General Assembly adopted the joint resolution on the continuation of the United Nations Special Committee on the Balkans, introduced in the First Committee jointly by Australia, China, the United Kingdom, and the United States, by a vote of 50 to 6 with 2 abstentions. At the same meeting the Assembly also adopted unanimously the resolution adopted previously by the First Committee on the repatriation of Greek children. For the texts of these two resolutions designated 288 (IV) A and B, respectively, see United Nations, Official Records of the General Assembly, Fourth Session, Resolutions, [Page 457] pages 9–10. (Hereafter cited as GA (IV), Resolutions.) The texts of these resolutions also appear in Carlye, Documents on International Affairs, 1949–50, pages 236–239 and A Decade of American Foreign Policy, 1941–49, pages 780–782. The Soviet draft resolution on Greece, which had failed to be adopted earlier by the First Committee, was again rejected by the General Assembly on a paragraph-by-paragraph vote. The General Assembly considered the Greek question for the last time during the Fourth Session when, at its 268th Plenary Meeting, December 5 (GA (IV), Plenary, page 522), the Soviet Delegation withdrew a proposed resolution concerning the suspension of certain Greek death sentences in favor of a resolution introduced by the Ecuadoran Delegation requesting Assembly President Romulo to ascertain the views of the Greek Government concerning the suspension of death sentences. For the text of this final resolution, designated 288 (IV) C, see GA (IV), Resolutions, page 10, or Carlyle, Documents on International Affairs, 1949–50, page 239. In a statement to the 276th and final Plenary Meeting of the General Assembly, December 10 (GA (IV), Plenary, page 615), President Romulo reported having been informed by the Greek Government that there had been no further executions following the recent Greek clemency legislation. For the text of Romulo’s statement, see the Department of State’s aide-mémoire of December 21 to the Greek Embassy, page 468. For a brief, authoritative account of General Assembly plenary meetings on the Greek question, see Howard, The Greek Question in the Fourth General Assembly, pages 22–23.