17041948  Text of the Speech made by General McNaughton (Canada) in the Security Council Meeting No. 284 held on 17 April, 1948

Text of the Speech made by General McNaughton (Canada) in the Security Council Meeting No. 284 held on 17 April, 1948

In accordance with the invitation of the President, I would like to offer a brief statement with regard to the draft resolutions presented to the Security Council by the six delegations whose names appear on the document.

It has always been the hope of the Canadian delegation. that, with the aid of the Security Council, the delegations of India and Pakistan would find it possible to reach, through the means of direct negotiation, an agreed basis for the settlement of their differences in regard to the State of Jammu and Kashmir, as well as on the other outstanding. matters before the Security Council.

If the Security Council now has to turn to the procedure of adopting a draft resolution whereby it offers to both parties the measures which, in our opinion, should constitute a basis for a fair and equitable settlement, it does so in full realisation of the fact that this draft resolution will have failed to achieve its purpose if the two parties themselves do not continue to make every effort to come together and co operate in regard to its implementation.

1 should like the delegations of India and Pakistan to know that the draft resolution before the Security Council represents the best advice which completely objective and fair-minded thought could bring to the difficult problem referred to us by the two parties, and with which the Security Council has been anxiously concerned for so many weeks.

In drawing up these proposals we have sought not only to find what measures would, in our view, be the most effective to bring about a cessation of fighting in the State of Jammu and Kashmir and to provide for conditions necessary for a free and fair plebiscite to determine the future of the State, but also to provide those measures which will make evident, both to the peoples of the subcontinent of India and to the world, the justice and fairness of the terms and procedures envisaged in our proposal.

All those who have been associated in formulating this. draft resolutions have been impressed with the unity of thought and purpose which has brought our minds together in working out the text. We have all had but one aim in mind; namely, how to bring about by peaceful means an end to the dispute between the sister Dominions of India and Pakistan over the State of Jammu and Kashmir.

As the President of the Security Council has indicated, the text before us represents what we think is fair, just and necessary. It is in this spirit that we commend the results of our endeavours to the Governments of India and Pakistan.