320/8–2252: Circular airgram
The Acting Secretary of State to Certain Diplomatic Missions
- Subject:
- Seventh Regular Session of the UN General Assembly
1. The next (seventh) regular session of the GA will convene in New York on October 14. Attached, for your background, is the provisional agenda for the session. We would, as in previous years, appreciate any information you may receive regarding any new agenda items which the government to which you are accredited is likely to propose. However, we wish to avoid giving any impression that we wish to stimulate the introduction of new items. In fact, in view of the size of the present agenda, the importance and urgency of a number of items, and the lateness of the session, we would be inclined to discourage the introduction of additional new items not strictly of an important and urgent character.
2. Advance Diplomatic Consultations
For your information, we are planning, even more extensively than in previous years, to consult other friendly governments in advance of the Assembly concerning the session as a whole and concerning certain significant agenda items. In respect of both, consultations will be held on the basis of our tentative views in order that we may be able to take the views of other governments into account, insofar as possible, in the formulation of our final positions. We will, therefore, between now and the convening of the GA, send several communications setting forth our tentative positions on a number of issues which you will be asked to discuss with the Foreign Office. We will parallel your approaches with consultations here in Washington with various diplomatic representatives and/or, through USUN, with members of the permanent UN delegations in New York.
There are indicated below the Department’s tentative positions on a number of items. You are requested, in your discretion, to outline these views to the Foreign Office and to report its reactions as soon as possible. As indicated above, you should indicate that these positions are tentative and that we will wish to take into account insofar as possible the views of other friendly governments in determining our final positions. (Detailed background information on most of the issues you will be asked to discuss may be found in the President’s Annual Reports [Page 419] to Congress on US Participation in the UN for 1951 and previous years.)
(a) President of the GA
So far as we know Pearson (Canadian Minister of External Affairs) is only candidate. Pearson appears to have very broad support and we believe he would be an excellent choice.
(b) Security Council Slate
The United States will support Denmark to replace the Netherlands and Lebanon to replace Turkey and both Denmark and Lebanon have been so informed. The United States will also support a Latin American state to replace Brazil. (FYI, with respect to the Latin American seat, we understand that the Latin American group is generally agreed on Colombia.) (The Assembly will also elect six members of the Economic and Social Council and two members of the Trusteeship Council. The Department has not yet formulated its positions on these slates and our views will be communicated in a subsequent circular.)
[Here follow discussion of seven agenda items and text of United Nations Document A/2158, August 15, 1952, “Provisional Agenda of the Seventh Regular Session of the General Assembly”, enumerating 65 agenda items.]