05021948  Text of the Speech made by Mr. Noel Baker (United Kingdom) in the Security Council Meeting No. 241 held on 5 February, 1948

 Text of the Speech made by Mr. Noel Baker (United Kingdom) in the Security Council Meeting No. 241 held on 5 February, 1948

I am very glad that we are now entering upon this debate on the substance of the settlement which, we hope, will be reached in the question of Kashmir. I am grateful for the speeches of those representatives who have preceded me, and for those of the representatives of India and Pakistan with which the discussion opened. I do not complain at all that in their speeches both parties made charges and counter-charges concerning raids on their own territory from the other side, and about killings which have taken place. I think that it was right for them to make those charges and counter-charges, even now when we are considering the substance, because it shows that the situation with which we are dealing is still dangerous in the extreme.

It is my conviction that raids and incidents will continue to occur until the question of Kashmir has been disposed of by the Security Council. Several incidents were cited here of which I have heard accounts given by both sides, and on which I have received independent reports. I could give an explanation of what occurred-an explanation which might make it appear that the blame on one side or the other was much less than might be thought at first sight. The explanation would show that in reality the incidents were due to an overriding fear. And, so long as fear dominates the minds of the peoples in that area of the Punjab and of Kashmir, incidents will continue and the situation will remain extremely grave.

We have embarked on the discussion of the substance of the question as to how we can stop the fighting, and I hope that we shall not cease to deal with this subject until we have evolved a scheme which will do the job. I have the greatest sympathy with the viewpoint from which the representative of India started. In response to a remark that fell from him about ten days ago, I said that the Security Council must be careful not to leave itself open to the charge of fiddling with phrases while Kashmir burned. That was made a headline in the Indian papers, "Council fiddles while Kashmir Burns". but I would not admit the charge so implied. Nevertheless, we must stop the fighting and we must stop it soon.

There has been some question as to what "stopping the fighting" means. Does it simply mean that India asks Pakistan to do its duty in closing the frontier, removing intruders, preventing the incursions of the tribesmen, and cutting off supplies, and that then the Indian Army can easily finish off the rest ? I feel sure that the representative of the United States was right when he said that is not what the Indian delegation wants. It wants a total stoppage of all acts of violence, and wants it now.

Can that result be achieved by the sort of action which it has been suggested that Pakistan should take, and by that alone? We are dealing with issues so grave that each of us must speak with full sincerity and with a full sense of responsibility for his words. It is my own view that the Security Council has never had a question of such magnitude as this, a question having such vast implications for the future of mankind. We must say what we really think

The representative of India quoted an article from The Times of London of 26 January. It is a very remarkable article. I read it and marked it-I have a copy before me now before the representative of India referred to it at all. I know that The Times never sends men who have not the highest experience on such jobs as this, and I have every reason to believe that the authority of this writer is very great. In any case, he was quoted-and quoted with approval by the representative of India. What is the meaning of the article? Taken as a whole, what does it say? It says that unless the Security Council reaches a solution of the Kashmir question which seems just to all, we shall not only not stop the fighting, but we shall provoke a far worse conflict than now exists because we shall bring down a new influx of the tribes.

I say with all conviction that the representative of India is quite right when he says that in getting a settlement, Pakistan must take strong action in this matter; that the Security Council must make it possible for Pakistan, in conjunction with India, to do so. We want a rea! total stoppage now, without further bloodshed, without more killing of t insurgents, whose votes, after all, we want in the plebiscite when it comes, our aim being to secure a responsible government, as the representative of India has stated. such a scheme.

The question is how to do it. We must get I was in warm agreement with much that was stated by the representative of China a few moments ago. I was not in full agreement with what he said about our Commission. I do not believe that we could pass a few resolutions here, send the Commission cut, and get a stoppage of the fighting. I think all my experience-and certainly all the information which I have received tells me that it will be far casier in the Security Council itself to obtain the agreement and the concessions which may be required on the part of both sides.

What is the substance of the agreement ? In the first place, there is Pakistan's duty in the matter of cutting off supplies, of stopping the tribesmen from coming in, of stopping their own volunteers, and of encouraging the insurgents to stop. There is the problem of getting those who have gone into Kashmir to come out of it. There is the problem of keeping order afterwards inside Kashmir.

It is my belief that those tasks can be accomplished only by the co-operation and the joint action of the two Governments, with the help of the Security Council in any way in which it can be given usefully. However, as the representative of the United States stated in the first speech which he made On this subject, we must add a political arrangement to that which will inspire confidence, an arrangement that will persuade all the parties to this unhappy fighting that it ought to end.

The members of the Security Council already have made. a good many suggestions as to what is needed. We have spent our leisure moments, such as we are allowed in this hospitable city, in reading the verbatim records of our discussions up to now. In the verbatim record of the 235th meeting, held on 24 January, we find proposals concerning the conditions of the plebiscite. We find proposals that the plebiscite should be. organized by under the authority of the Security Council. We find proposals that there should be an interim administration recognized as free from the smell of brimstone, not involved in the present fighting, and as impartial and perfect as two great countries like India and Pakistan can make it. We find proposals for adequate arrangements for emigres to come home, arrangements that will give those emigres confidence that they will be alright when they get home, arrangements which will induce them to start on their journey homeward, arrangements for the maintenance of order under the law. We find proposals with regard to all those points.

In this debate we have had further elaboration with regard to some of those proposals. I am in broad agreement with what has been said by the members of the Security Council. I do not believe we shall avert a war unless we can get a scheme founded on the propositions which have been put forward.

Of course, the vital part of this, the part to which everything else leads, is, as the representative of China so rightly urged just now, and as the representative of Argentina urged with great force yesterday [240th meeting], the plebiscite itself. We have had much discussion as to whether we shall consider first the plebiscite or the stopping of the war first, whether we shall consider the plebiscite and work backwards, or whether we shall consider the stopping of the war and work forward. We always have come to the same conclusion, and all the speeches which have been made during this present debate have brought us to that conclusion that we must consider the whole thing together.

I repeat, as so many others have said before, that if the combatants are now to cease the carnage, they must know what is to happen when they do. They are risking their lives because they believe it is better to die than to surrender. We have to remove the basis of that belief. The plebiscite is the vital part of the whole settlement. It was suggested yesterday and I have the exact words-"that the conduct of the plebiscite was not really the business of the United Nations; that it really did not concern the United Nations; that, after all, the holding of it was a matter for the Government and the people of Jammu and Kashmir".

If the arguments presented by the members of the Council prevail-as I hope they will prevail-every member of the Security Council should now agree that the plebiscite is really a matter of vital interest to every nation in the United Nations for whom we speak. The plebiscite is the culminating instrument by which the fighting can be stopped. It is the means by which we can create stable conditions in which an assured peace for the years to come shall be established. between India and Pakistan; it is the means by which we hope to avert a conflict which will involve 400 million people.

That must be of vital concern to every nation. The principle was enunciated long ago by Woodrow Wilson in his draft of Article 11 of the Covenant of the League of Nations which read: "Any war or threat of war, immediately affecting any of the members of the League or not, is hereby declared a matter of concern to the whole League..."This principle was put in a new form which won the approbation and consent of the whole world, by a famous spokesman of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, who said that peace is indivisible.

Everything which affects peace affects everyone. It is declared in the Charter in Article I, paragraph 1; Article 2, paragraph 5, and Article 24, paragraph 1, and in other places, too.

This plebiscite must inspire confidence in everybody, including those who are now fighting. We have all stated it before. The representative of India said at our 239th meeting the day before yesterday that the two parties interested in the Kashmir question are Pakistan and the insurgents in Kashmir. Therefore, we have to satisfy these two parties. What the Security Council does must seem fair to these two parties. It must also seem fair to the Government of Pakistan, to the insurgents, to the tribesmen, to the Government of India, to the other inhabitants of Jammu and Kashmir, and to the outside world. That is why I arrived at the same conclusion as the other members of the Security Council who stated that in partial, interim administrative arrangements must be made. If we are looking into the past for precedents, I may say that I lived through two international crises; one over Upper Silesia and one over the Saar. I think that the arrangements made for those crises between the two wars will certainly be in agreement with proposals which have been made here. Therefore, I hope that we shall now give full consideration to these concrete proposals which the members of the Security Council have put forward. As was said very well by the United States representative yesterday, nothing said by either the delegation of Pakistan or the delegation of India has been brushed aside or rejected.

I hope we shall consider the concrete proposals put forward by the members of the Security Council to end the carnage, to get the tribesmen and the other intruders out of Kashmir, to restore order and maintain it when it has been restored, and to organise the plebiscite and ensure by fair and impartial interim administrative arrangements that the plebiscite is properly conducted.

If we are to do that, I venture to think, with great respect, that the two resolutions which are before us are no longer quite adequate. It may be worthwhile for us to see if we cannot obtain a new and more comprehensive proposal which we can take up and upon the basis of which we can arrive at a definite conclusion in the early future. I say "early future", because we shall soon be in the fourth week of our work. I believe that the members of the Security Council have a special duty-even greater than they had last Friday -to reach a plan which will bring rapid, complete, and final peace. I am certain that the peoples of India and Pakistan are capable of the great wave of generosity that is needed to bring them together and to make peace possible. I-like other members of the Security Council, but perhaps more than some of the others have spent my life studying how wars begin, what people think wars are for, and the results to which wars lead. In this connection I asked myself, "Is Kashmir to be another Alsace-Lorraine ?" One of my friends wrote a book in which he said that Kashmir was to lovely a country that no lifetime was long enough to absorb the wonder of it. However, rather than have a war over Kashmir, it would be better that the people should be given their choice of either Pakistan or India and that Kashmir should disappear beneath the waves. The alternative to a settlement here is a conflict; let us ensure that this does not happen.