Ireland, 1969

49. Madam President, on behalf of the delegation of Ireland I should

like to congratulate you warmly on your election to preside over

the deliberations of this session of the General Assembly. We welcome

the choice of a distinguished citizen of Liberia to fill this

high office. Your many past contributions to the work of

the United Nations guarantee that you will discharge the

functions of the Presidency in a manner calculated to

advance the goal enunciated in your opening address — to

ensure that the Organization promotes “peace, the welfare

of all, and the effectiveness of the Charter as a whole”

[1753rd meeting, para. 63].

50. My delegation would like, at this time, to record our

sincere regret at the death of the President of the

twenty-third session of the Assembly. The Irish delegation

admired the great talents of His Excellency Mr. Emilio

Arenales and, despite serious illness, the dedication he

displayed as President. We were grieved that lie should pass

away at such an early age. Our sympathy goes out to the

delegation of Guatemala.

51. Representatives are no doubt aware, from my recent

appearances before the Security Council [1503rd meeting]

and the General Committee [180th meeting], that we in

Ireland are gravely concerned about the situation in the

north of Ireland. I shall speak on that later. At this stage,

and since this is the first occasion on which I have the

honour to address the Assembly on behalf of Ireland, I

should like to reiterate the strong commitment of my

Government to the objectives and purposes of the Charter.

That commitment has consistently informed our policies

and attitudes within the United Nations. It will continue to

do so and our aim will continue to be to promote the

vigour and efficacy of the Organization. My delegation,

therefore, regrets that during the past twelve months, to

quote from the opening sentence of our distinguished

Secretary-General in the introduction to his annual report:

“the deterioration of the international situation, which I

noted in the introduction to the annual report last year, has

continued” [A/7601/Add.1, para. 1].

52. It was in June 1968 that the Assembly, after a long

and detailed discussion at the resumed twenty-second

session, commended the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of

Nuclear Weapons [resolution 2373 (XXII)]. That was a full

fifteen months ago. It is thus a matter of concern that the

Treaty has not yet become effective and also that it still

needs to be formally ratified by two of the three nuclear

signatories, and that a substantial proportion of the other

ratifications required for its entry into force have not been

deposited.

53. There has, it is true, been one encouraging development

in the field of nuclear non-proliferation, in that the

Treaty of Tlatelolco has received the requisite number of

ratifications and that the Agency for the Prohibition of

Nuclear Weapons in Latin America has now been established.

My delegation would like to congratulate the

delegations of Latin America on this achievement. We hope

that it will lead to others, and that it will, in particular,

serve to accelerate ratification of the non-proliferation

Treaty by many more States and, immediately, by the

remaining two of the three nuclear signatories. In expressing

this hope, we have especially in mind that the debates at

the resumed twenty-second session revealed a considerable

volume of opinion to the effect that the Treaty constitutes

an indispensable first step towards further measures of

nuclear disarmament. The need for speed is all the more

evident when we recall that eleven years have passed since

the proposal for a non-proliferation treaty was first

submitted by the Irish delegation under the leadership of

Mr. Frank Aiken [751st meeting, para. 82).

54. In this connexion, it is right to remind ourselves not

only that it is an explicit function of the Assembly under

Article 11 of the Charter to deal with disarmament but that

Article 26 implicitly enjoins Member States to limit the use

for armaments of the world’s human and economic

resources. The least that can be said is that the present

position in that regard is most disappointing. The

Secretary-General has pointed out that, while it was

estimated in 1962 that total world expenditure for military

purposes had reached the enormous figure of about

$120,000 million per year, the rate today is estimated at

about $200,000 million. It is not surprising that the

Secretary-General should feel that “even allowing for the

increase in the price level, this inflation of military

expenditure is both startling and depressing”

[A/7601/Add.1, para, 40]. Consequently, the Irish delegation

strongly supports the Secretary-General’s proposal that

the decade of the 1970s, already designated as the Second

United Nations Development Decade, should likewise be a

disarmament decade [ibid., para. 42]. Dedicating the same

decade simultaneously to these two purposes will serve to

bring out the link between them in terms of the best use of

economic and human resources.

55. The Irish delegation will continue to support the

conclusion of a comprehensive test ban treaty and generally

acceptable measures for the banning of chemical and

biological means of warfare as well as the spread of nuclear

and other mass-destruction weapons to the sea-bed.

56. The question of peace-keeping operations is again

before the Assembly. Member States will be aware of the

views expressed by the Irish delegation on this subject at

earlier sessions, and of our endeavours in recent years to

provide for a reliable and satisfactory system of financing

duly authorized peace-keeping operations. It is not necessary

for me to detail now the many arguments in favour of

such a system: the matter will be debated later in the

Special Political Committee and in plenary in connexion

with item 35. I will confine myself here to saying that my

delegation has noted the remarks in paragraph 80 of the

introduction to the Secretary-General’s annual report about

the uncertainty concerning the maintenance of the United

Nations Force in Cyprus, the main current United Nations

peace-keeping operation, because of the unsatisfactory

nature of the financial arrangements. We have noted too the

statements already made, in the course of the general

debate by a number of speakers, about the great importance

in certain situations of a peace-keeping operation, and

the necessity to put such operations on a proper footing.

57. The Irish people have watched with sadness and

distress the continuation of the tragic conflict in Nigeria — a

country with which Ireland has very close ties, stretching

well back into the last century, through direct and

continuing contacts between our two peoples. It is our

hope that a just settlement of the problem will be speedily

reached with the assistance of the Organization of African

Unity. We most earnestly and urgently appeal to all

concerned to strive, despite the political difficulties, to find

ways of maintaining and indeed increasing the flow of

international relief supplies so desperately needed.

58. This is the third regular session of the Assembly whose

agenda contains an item on the situation in the Middle East

arising out of the hostilities of June 1967. That no

substantial progress has been made in resolving that

situation is most disquieting, bearing in mind the possibility

of a recrudescence of major hostilities in the area. In that

event there would clearly be a risk of the big Powers being

drawn in for various reasons including the traditional

strategic importance of the Middle East. It is therefore

discouraging that the Secretary-General should record a

marked deterioration in the situation. My Government

noted with concern the anxious appeals he felt obliged to

make in recent months for the exercise of restraint by the

parties directly concerned and for the cessation of the

many grave incidents which have unnecessarily risked the

safety of the military observers along the Suez Canal. As

the Secretary-General has well said, the whole situation in

the area creates “a crisis of effectiveness for the United

Nations and for its Members” [A/7601/Add.1, para. 65].

The Irish delegation sincerely hopes that the mission of the

Special Representative of the Secretary-General in the

Middle East, Ambassador Jarring, will bear fruit worthy of

the patient and persistent efforts on which he has been

engaged, and that the Big Four, who have been seconding

those efforts for the past six months, will enable him to

bring his mission to a successful conclusion at a very early

date.

59. The Secretary-General’s introduction to his annual

report calls attention to the particular problem of the

hijacking of commercial passenger aircraft. It is a problem

to which no country can be indifferent and which is of

special concern to all Member States operating international

air services. We all know the great cost of operating regular

air services and what a heavy financial burden the disruption

caused by the practice of piracy in the air can place

on airlines, especially those of smaller countries, not to

speak of the addition to the already heavy responsibility of

airline pilots and crews. The Irish delegation therefore

associates itself with the appeals made by the Secretary-General

for a successful outcome to the efforts being made

by the International Civil Aviation Organization to remove

this threat to reliable air communications and to the lives of

innocent travellers.

60. A section of the Secretary-General’s introduction

which the Irish delegation finds of particular interest is that

relating to the exercise of his good offices. We subscribe

entirely to his statement, against the background of earlier

consideration of this point that “I have come to the clear

conclusion that I am competent under the Charter to use

my good offices” [ibid., para. 185]. Indeed we feel that the

legitimate role of the Secretary-General in this field is in

some ways broader than is sometimes conceded.

61. I may recall here the view expressed by the Irish

delegation on 28 September 1967 [1571st meeting] that

the Secretary-General should be entitled to appoint a

special representative without necessarily seeking further

authorization. This continues to be our interpretation of

the scope of Article 99. And in the same context I may say

that my delegation is of the opinion that the good offices

of the Secretary-General could be of very great value in

giving effect to one of the main purposes of the United

Nations. I have in mind the purpose set out in Article 1,

paragraph 4, of the Charter, which says that the United

Nations should be “a centre for harmonizing the actions of

nations in the attainment of these common ends”.

62. In that regard my delegation has noted with much

interest the statement made here by the Foreign Minister of

Sweden on 19 September 1969, that at the present time the

principle role of the United Nations as far as current

conflicts are concerned is:

“...to serve as a centre for the expression and

formation of international opinion, to encourage and

facilitate co-operation and agreement between the States

concerned and to offer the formal framework for such

co-operation and agreement” [1757th meeting, para. 3].

63. During the fifteen years since - my country became a

Member of the United Nations, Ireland - has endeavoured by

word and deed to prove its loyalty to the purposes and

principles of the Charter. We have honoured the obligations

of membership and we have striven to contribute to the

attainment of the ends for which the Organization was

founded. And the basic purpose for which the United

Nations was founded was and remains, the preservation of

peace.

64. We have not hitherto sought to bring before the

United Nations in a formal manner our greatest political

problem, the partition of Ireland, a problem at once

national and international. In the detailed debate which

took place in the Irish Parliament in July 1946 on the

question of seeking admission to the United Nations it was

agreed that, whereas under the Charter membership would

impose serious obligations, it would be wrong to look to

the Organization for national advantage only, and that it

would be misleading to suggest that the United Nations

would solve the vital problem of Ireland’s national reunification.

That was made clear. Our Parliament unanimously

recommended that the Government seek admission because

of our dedication to the purposes of the United Nations

and because of the great potential of the Organization for

advancing the cause of peace and establishing a better world

order.

65. We have ourselves sought to achieve reunification

through co-operation by means enjoined by the Charter. We

have not had, nor do we now have, any wish to achieve it

by force; nor would we have wished, without grave reason,

to ventilate in this forum the faults of the Belfast

Administration or the acquiescence up to now of British

Governments in those faults. We have had no expectation

of reunion through a verdict on the part of the world

community. Even if such a verdict were obtainable and

enforceable, we realize that it could well create a situation

in which some of our fellow citizens in a united Ireland

might feel embittered and alienated. We have no desire to

vitiate the spirit of co-operation which has begun to grow

between the two parts of our divided country or the

amicable relations which have developed between the

peoples of Ireland and Great Britain after centuries of strife

and confrontation.

66. That we nevertheless addressed two requests to the

United Nations in recent weeks in connexion with this

problem is due to the grave situation which developed in

Northern Ireland through the growing impatience and

frustrations of the minority at the persistent denial to them

of human rights and fundamental freedoms. It is a situation

which constitutes a real and present danger to the lives,

homes and livelihood of a substantial number of Irish

citizens in that area and a threat to the amicable relations

with Britain, to which I have just referred. But it still

remains our earnest hope that the goal which the great

majority of the Irish people ardently desire will be achieved

by mutual consent.

67. My Government has sought to create an atmosphere of

confidence and friendship between the two areas of Ireland

through economic and social co-operation. But this

co-operation, although it undoubtedly improved the climate of

opinion North and South, did not alter the basic economic

and political disadvantages of the minority in the North.

These disadvantages derive primarily from the institutionalized

system of economic, political and social discrimination

of which the minority have been the victims for the last fifty years.

68. The immediate plight of the minority is our most

urgent concern. For we are convinced that the heart of the

matter lies in the partition of Ireland, which originally

brought about the political structure of Northern Ireland

and gave the Unionist Party there the degree of autonomous

control which permitted them to discriminate against

the minority.

69. The Government of Ireland Act of 1920 which

established Northern Ireland — an Act of the British Parliament

for which no Irish Member North or South voted — and

the subsequent Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 radically

altered the relationship between Britain and Ireland. Although

the relationships between Britain and the now

independent part of Ireland resulted in sovereign control by

the Government at Dublin over twenty-six of the thirty-two

counties of our country, that is, over three of the four

historic provinces of Ireland and one third of the fourth

province, Ulster, the position of the Government in the six

North Eastern Counties remained one of subordination to

Britain. The 1920 Act installed a régime in power in the six

counties with tragic results, to which the whole world is

now witness. The division of Ireland was a poor and

unimaginative arrangement which, like other similar

arrangements before and since, contained within it the seeds

of perpetual dissension and discontent.

70. We believe that the division of Ireland and the present

denial of human rights to the minority in the six counties

are intimately interrelated, and until both issues are

honourably resolved there can be no true and lasting peace.

It must not be forgotten that the Government of Ireland

Act of 1920, although responsible for the present situation,

explicitly envisaged the reunification of Ireland. Indeed,

when he formally opened the Northern Parliament in June

1921, the late King George V of England expressed the

hope that this step would prove to be no more than

“the prelude of the day in which the Irish people,

North and South, under one parliament or two, as those

parliaments may themselves decide, shall work together in

common love for Ireland upon the sure foundation of

mutual justice and respect”.

71. It was a hope which reflected the conviction expressed

some years earlier by the then British Prime Minister,

Mr. Asquith, that “Ireland is a nation; not two nations, but

one nation“. He went on to say:

“There are few cases in history, and as a student of

history in a humble way, I myself know none, of a

nationality at once so distinct, so persistent, and so

assimilative as the Irish”.

72. I have already said that it is the policy of my

Government to seek the reunification of Ireland by

peaceful means. In so stating I am but echoing what has

often been said elsewhere by those qualified to speak for

the Irish people, and most recently by our Prime Minister a

few days ago. The unity we seek, he declared, is not

something forced but a free and genuine union of those

living in Ireland, based on mutual respect and tolerance and

guaranteed by a form or forms of government in Ireland

providing for progressive improvement of social, economic

and cultural life in a just and peaceful environment.

73. The united Ireland we desire is one in which there

would be a scrupulously fair deal for all. Differences in

political outlook or religious belief need not set people

apart. They exist in most countries and they are no barrier

to effective and constructive co-operation. The real barriers

are those created by fear, suspicion and intolerance.

74. Reiterating what the Prime Minister stated on that

occasion, I may say that the events of the past months have

made it evident to all that while disrupting the unity of

Ireland the 1920 devolution of powers has not provided a

system of government acceptable, as fair and just, to very

many of the people in Northern Ireland. The truth and

validity of this assertion are amply demonstrated by a

recent objective report. I refer, of course, to the report of

the Commission appointed by the Belfast Administration

and headed by the distinguished Scottish judge, Lord

Cameron. The report makes clear the urgent need for change.

75. We are concerned that the grievances of so many of

our fellow Irish men and women be quickly remedied and

their fears set at rest. We also have a legitimate concern

regarding the disposition to be made by the British

Government in relation to the future administration of

Northern Ireland. Our views on how peace and justice can

be assured in our small island are relevant and entitled to be

heard. Our direct interest in this matter has been recognized

publicly by the British Prime Minister, Mr. Harold Wilson.

76. Speaking at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg in

January 1967, Mr. Wilson said:

“I know, just as my predecessors, that no one would be

happier than Great Britain if this problem were solved by

agreement within the Emerald Isle. I am sure that I am

speaking for everyone in expressing the hope that over

the next few years we shall see an intensification of the

process of coming together which has begun during the

last three or four years“.

And, again, Mr. Wilson referred to

“the real duty of all those in Northern and Southern

Ireland, without propaganda and with a genuine desire to

solve the problems, to get together and solve the Irish

problem so that” — as he expressed it — “we can all express

our warm blessing to them for solving it“.

77. These are generous sentiments. At the same time we

must not overlook the fact that the ultimate responsibility

for the present situation in Northern Ireland rests in

London. The British Government has recognized this. It is

our earnest hope that the British Government will persevere

in its determination to see that the necessary reforms in the

North — the reforms which are required by the United

Nations Charter — are speedily and irreversibly effected and

that they will soon come to deal with the root cause.

Because of our direct interest in these questions, it would

be only natural that the British and Irish Governments,

both Members of the United Nations, should consult and

work together in the spirit of the Charter in order to arrive

at a just and lasting solution.

78. If I have spoken at some length about the problem of

Northern Ireland, the reason is that the partition of our

country, a historic unit, has been a constant — indeed a

major — preoccupation of our people, whether at home or in

the many lands in which great numbers of them now reside.

That my Government has felt constrained to raise the

matter formally now is due to the gravity which the

situation has assumed in these last months. The question,

we genuinely believe, is one which is a proper concern of

the United Nations, involving as it does infringements of

the principles of the Charter.

79. Before concluding I wish to say how deeply touched

the Irish delegation was by the very friendly reference to

our problem made by the Foreign Ministers of France

[1763rd meeting] and Iceland [1762nd meeting], two

countries for which the Irish nation has a warm sympathy

arising from ties of kinship and of intercourse extending

over many centuries.

80. I conclude by expressing the most earnest hope that

the deliberations of this session of the Assembly will be a

source of encouragement and help to resolve their last

outstanding problem between two close neighbours.