It is just over a year since General Eisenhower exchanged the academic robes he had donned so shortly before for the uniform with which his name and fame were more closely related. This time, despite the ”US” on his lapels, he became, as he has said, only ”one-twelfth” American. The eleven-twelfths he dedicated to the other nations of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. To that body, and its goal of European cooperation for defense against aggression, he has devoted a full measure of his time and energy.

The state of China — a nation of possibly 460,000,000 people — has been a Member of the United Nations since the foundation of that organization in 1945. As a Member, China is legally entitled to representation in United Nations organs unless and until, pursuant to preventive or enforcement action taken by the Security Council, the exercise of the rights and privileges of membership may be suspended by the General Assembly upon recommendation of the Security Council. The representatives of China in United Nations organs from 1945 to the present have been accredited by the National Government of the Republic of China. By the end of 1949 control over the mainland of China and over perhaps 450,000,000 people had passed from the National Government to the (communist) “Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China,” the effective control of the National Government having been reduced largely to the island of Formosa.

Eight years ago the United States set out, at the request of American editors and press associations, to increase the amount of information available to its own and other peoples through international compacts. What began as a project for lowering barriers to the gathering and transmission of news soon developed into an effort to assure freedom of information and expression to all peoples in the belief that without such basic freedoms there can be no other enduring freedoms and very little progress towards the good life.

The General Assembly concluded its sixth session in Paris on February 5, 1952 having considered an agenda of more than seventy items. Major political questions before the Assembly included: disarmament and prohibition of the atomic bomb; collective measures; the establishment of a commission to investigate the possibility of German elections; termination of the United Nations Commission on the Balkans; and Palestine and related problems. The question of the independence of Korea was deferred pending the conclusion of armistice negotiations.

This issue covers the work of the Security Council from its 569th meeting on December 19, 1951 to its 572nd meeting on January 31, 1952. During December the President of the Council was the representative of Ecuador (Quevedo) and during January, the representative of France (Chauvel). While the India-Pakistan question was being discussed the representative of India was present'at the meetings. In addition to its other work the Council officially terminated the Conventional Armaments Commission in view of the Assembly's sixth session decision to establish a Disarmament Commission.

The second part of the thirteenth session of the Economic and Social Council was held in Paris from December 18 to 21, 1951 to consider work plans and provisional agenda for 1952.1 It was decided to include on the 1952 agenda the question of Japan's admission to ECAFE as an associate member, as proposed by Pakistan, and to exclude other items – the problem of statelessness, the plight of survivors1 of concentration camps and the reports of the Council's Ad HocCommittee on Forced Labor. A Soviet proposal to hold a single session during 1952 was adopted by a vote of 7 to 4 with 3 abstentions. This session, the fourteenth, was scheduled to begin on May 13.

Anglo-Iranian Oil Case: On December 20, 1951, at the request of the Imperial Government of Iran, the Court granted a one month extension of the time-limit (to February 11, 1952) for the deposit of Iran's counter-memorial or preliminary objection.1 On February 11, the government of Iran deposited with the Registry of the Court a document entitled “Preliminary observations: refusal by the Imperial Government to recognize the jurisdiction of the Court”. As a result of the Iranian objection, which was presented in accordance with the conditions laid down by the rules of the Court, the proceedings on the merits were, as of that date, suspended. By an order of the same date, the President of the Court fixed March 27, 1952, as the time-limit granted to the United Kingdom to submit to the Court its written observations on the Iranian exception.

On January 11, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development made a loan of $29,700,000 for electric power development in Mexico. The loan was to be used to finance imports of equipment and materials needed to carry out seven major projects in the 1952–1955 construction program of Mexico's Federal Electricity Commission. The loan, made for a term of 25 years and bearing interest at the rate of 4J½ percent per annum, was the third made to Mexico for power development, in support of that country's current industrial and agricultural expansion. It was estimated that, together with the loans of 1949 and 1950, the loan would contribute to the near doubling of Mexico's electric generating capacity in a span of seven years. The joint borrowers were the Comision Federal de Electricidad, a government agency charged with the development of electric power, and Nacional Financiera, the official financing institution of the Mexican government. The loan was guaranteed by the Mexican government.

The fourteenth session of the Council, convened on September 28, was adjourned on December 14, 1951. The Council adopted twenty amendments to Annex 8 (Airworthiness of Aircraft), arising out of the work of the Airworthiness Division at its fourth session. Action was also taken on recommendations 1 to 23 of the Search and Rescue Division, third session, the details of which were communicated to member states as a forward to the division's report. The Council noted with satisfaction the agreements reached at the special meeting on coordination of air traffic in western Europe4 held in Paris in October 1951, directed that the report of the meeting be published as an ICAO document, and urged all affected states to give high priority to the coordination of their national requirements for the use of air space in western Europe. It was hoped that the progress made would be consolidated at the European-Mediterranean Regional Air Navigation Meeting to convene in Paris on February 26, 1952. Further, the Council: approved the program recommended by the Air Navigation Commission for keeping regional plans up to date and for isolating the more critical deficiencies in air navigation facilities and services; decided to recommend to the Assembly the adoption, with minor amendments, of the draft revised constitution of the Legal Committee prepared by that committee at its seventh session;0 approved the convening of the subcommittee established to continue work on the revision of the 1929 Warsaw Convention.

The ad hoc Committee on Forced Labor which was established jointly by the United Nations and the International Labor Organization, pursuant to an Economic and Social Council decision of March 1951,1 held its first session in Geneva from October 8 to 27, 1951.3 The committee, composed of Sir Ramaswami Mudaliar (India, chairman), Paal Berg (Norway) and F. F. Palavicini (Mexico), issued an invitation to all non-governmental organizations to supply it with documentary material and information. The committee reported that it would have to investigate “all the laws and regulations of the various states which might illustrate the different systems of forced labour employed in those States”, adding that it might also have to investigate existing administrative practices which enable forced labor to be put into effect. At its next session, scheduled to be held at New York from May 26 to July 3, 1952, the committee was to examine the replies of governments to its questionnaire, as well as hear and question the representatives of interested non-governmental organizations.

The ninth and final session of the International Refugee Organization's General Council was held in Geneva from February 11 to 16, 1952. All but two (China and Iceland) of the member states were represented at the session, as were observers of six non-member states, the Holy See, the United Nations, the International Labor Organization, the World Health Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Having elected officers for the session and having approved the report on the eighth session, the General Council received and considered, from the acting chairman of the Eligibility Review Board, a report covering the period from July 1 to December 31, 1951; during which time 2,606 decisions were made after 1,086 appellants had received personal interviews. The acting chairman revealed that during the entire life of the board 21,906 personal hearings had been given and 36,742 decisions had been made involving approximately 80,000 persons, with the eligibility criteria for IRO services — under the policy guidance of the Executive Committee and General Council — becoming more and more lenient as the operation progressed. The acting chairman of the board, having outlined to the council the reasons why it was still useful for refugees in Germany and elsewhere to be determined eligible for IRO services despite the fact that IRO had ceased to grant such services, stated that the board would finalize as many outstanding appeals as possible before it ceased to exist on February 15, 1952.

The fifth session of the General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization had authorized the Director-General (Bodet) “to assist in the establishment of a World Braille Council”, but subsequent investigation had revealed that the existing state of development of Braille in the different regions of the world, and the lack of properly established national or regional organizations, rendered impossible the creation of an independent council. UNESCO's Executive Board, therefore, at its twenty-eighth session, authorized the Director-General to establish provisionally a World Braille Council attached to UNESCO in the form of an advisory committee, in which connection the Director-General summoned a committee of experts to work out the composition and role of the proposed council. The consultative committee met in Paris from December 10 to 12, 1951, prepared draft statutes for the council, and made recommendations as to the methods of work of the council and the tasks which it should undertake. Under the terms of the proposed statutes, the World Braille Council (WBC), to be composed of nine members with technical and regional qualifications and to be convened at least once every five years at the call of UNESCO's Director-General, would have the following functions: 1) advise the Director-General on all matters relating to the maintenance or extension of uniformity in Braille usage; 2) advise the Director-General as to the best means of establishing liaison with interested organizations'; and 3) deal with any other matters referred to it by the Director-General. Further, the consultative committee recommended, for the purpose of the council's work, the division of the world into eight lingual zones and suggested that WBC's program include musical notation, mathematical and science symbols, the compilation of an international catalogue, the establishment of regional councils, and assistance in the continuation and coordination of uniform Braille systems for the African and southeast Asian languages.

The annual report for the year 1951 by the World Health Organization's Director-General (Chisholm) to the World Health Assembly and the United Nations stated that — while there had been neither any spectacular advances toward the goals of WHO, nor any disquieting setbacks — the year had been characterized by “the gradual but unmistakable development of a ‘world health consciousness’ and by a broadening of the general concept of the right to health”. Among the more important trends in world health, the report noted: 1) the increasing awareness of the importance of health in industrial, agricultural, and general social and economic advancement; 2) the growing emphasis on the education and training of medical personnel and increasing governmental recognition of the importance of WHO's health units and health demonstration areas; 3) the evidence of growing international cooperation in health matters; 4) the continuation, with WHO's help and guidance, of long-term governmental public-health programs and of the important campaigns to educate the masses of the people on questions of public and private health, in order to gain the enthusiastic support without which no amount of national or international planning or action could hope to be successful; and 5) the continuation of efforts toward the mass control of diseases such as yaws, non-venereal infantile syphilis, malaria, tuberculosis, and typhoid. The report also directed attention to WHO's work during 1951 in birth control, particularly through the Regional Committee for South-East Asia; the European influenza epidemic; the direction of health work among the Palestine refugees and the civilian populations in Korea; and the completion of the drafting of the International Sanitary Regulations and their adoption by the fourth World Health Assembly.

At the thirteenth session of the Caribbean Commission it was announced that agreements had been made between the Technical Cooperation Administration of the United States and the governments of France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom for technical assistance in the field of aided self-help housing, $68,000 being allotted for a two-year period. The commission, at this session, 1) accepted the recommendation that a statement of the radio stations issuing hurricane warnings and a list of frequencies and power output be sent to interested governments at the start of the hurricane season; 2) selected Guadeloupe as the site for the fourteenth session of the commission opening on May 5; 3) agreed that a trade promotion conference should be held, which would include a discussion on the effect of tariffs; 4) agreed on a provisional agenda for the fifth session of the West Indian Conference; and 5) agreed that the fields selected for emphasis in new projects should be limited to agriculture, forestry and fisheries development, industrial development and housing. The commission also adopted the following schedule of conferences for 1952: industrial development, in Puerto Rico in February; fisheries, in Trinidad in March; existing and potential timber trade, in Trinidad in April; Eastern Caribbean Hurricane Subcommission, in Trinidad in June (second meeting); cooperative workshop, in Puerto Rico in July or August; and home economics, in Trinidad in the latter part of the year or early 1953. A proposal that the commission study the problem of providing credit for small farmers and a resolution urging governments to encourage the maximum use and development of natural resources were approved, while the commission urged implementation of a previous resolution relating to freedom of the air.

Committee of Ministers:The tenth session of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe met in Paris on March 19 and 20, 1952 under the chairmanship of Oesten Bo Unden, Swedish Minister for Foreign Affairs. This being the first meeting of the committee since the third session of the Consultative Assembly held in Strasbourg from November 26 to December 11, 1951, one of the items on the agenda was the examination of recommendations adopted at the session.

Austrian State Treaty: In furtherance of the September 14, 1951, statement of the French, United Kingdom and United States foreign ministers, that there was “no justification for any further delay in the conclusion of a treaty for the reestablishment of a free and independent Austria”,1 the United States deputy for the Austrian State Treaty (Reber) issued an invitation on December 28, 1951, suggesting that a meeting of the deputies be held at London on January 21, 1952. The governments of the United Kingdom and France immediately accepted the invitation, but the Soviet reply, dated January 18, made the following objections that: 1) no action had been taken on the Soviet proposal to conduct an investigation on the extent of Austria's implementation of the four powers' decisions on demilitarization and denazification; and 2) conclusion of an Austrian treaty was unwise until the western powers had implemented their obligations under the Italian treaty, particularly with regard to the creation ofthe Free Territory of Trieste which had been “turned into an Anglo-American military base. The reply of the western powers, dated January 19 pointed out that: 1) their views on denazification and demilitarization had been made clear in the Allied Council in Vienna, “the proper body to consider such questions”; 2) the Trieste issue had no relation to the Austrian treaty; and 3) that the express purpose of the meeting which had been called for January 21 was to conclude an Austrian treaty as speedily as possible, to which end they reiterated their invitation to the Soviet deputy.

Meeting in Lisbon from February 20 to 25, 1952, and with Greece and Turkey participating as full members, the ninth session of the Council of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization took decisions on five major items: 1) the forces to be made available to the military command during 1952; 2) the bases and facilities to be built and made available for the forces; 3) the establishment of a European Defense Community comprising six countries, including western Germany; 4) the report by the occupying powers on the proposed contractual arrangements with the German Federal Republic; 5) the reorganization and strengthening of NATO itself. In addition, the Council took note of the report by the Atlantic Community Committee on economic cooperation, agreed on the amount of the German financial contribution to defense for 1952–1953 and assigned the ground and air forces of Greece and Turkey to the over-all command of SHAPE.

Meeting on January 7, 1952, the Council of OEEC agreed that for January, February and March, Belgium, a constant creditor in the European Payments Union, would receive a maximum of $60 million in gold — a reduction of 25 percent on the previous allowance. This was a partial solution to the problem of Belgium's excess credit position. The Council also recommended that member countries try to increase exports to Belgium and that Belgium increase its imports from them.

The Charter of the Organization of American States came into effect on December 13, 1951 upon the deposit of the fourteenth ratification, that of Colombia.

Meeting to examine the progress of the Colombo Plan, the ministers of Australia, Burma, Cambodia, Canada, Ceylon, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, United Kingdom, United States and Vietnam, convened the Consultative Committee at Karachi on March 24, 1952. The committee was to discuss any alterations in the six-year programs in the light of changed circumstances, and detailed programs for the first two years. Press reports indicated that major importance was placed on the questions of the admission of Japan and possible United States financial aid.