After years of hesitation, Canada is now seriously considering full membership in the Organization of American States (OAS). The initiative for this shift in policy has come, not from officials in die Department of External Affairs, but principally from Prime Minister John Diefenbaker and especially die Secretary of State for External Affairs, Howard Green. Both have returned within die past year from visits soudi of the Rio Grande critical of Canada's traditional neglect of its interests in Latin America.

The problem of squaring the circle is not confined to mathematics. A somewhat similar task confronts the members of the Organization of American States (OAS) as they seek to enlarge respect for human rights and to create a firmer basis for democratic institutions in the life of the western hemisphere while maintaining the treasured principle of non-intervention. Not a new problem, it has increased in urgency in the last few years with the mounting opposition to dictatorships throughout the continent, with the increasingly communist orientation of Castro's government in Cuba, and with the political unrest elsewhere in Latin America to which Castro's victory appears to have contributed. Faced somewhat obliquely at the Sixth and Seventh Meetings of Foreign Ministers in Costa Rica in August 1960, it will have to be confronted more directly at the Eleventh International Conference of American States to be held in Ecuador in May 1961. The agenda for the Eleventh Conference contains items relating both to the protection of human rights and to the preservation of representative democracy.

One of the responsibilities of the UN General Assembly is to encourage the progressive development and codification of international law. One method it may use in discharging diis responsibility is the convening of conferences to draft international conventions for submission to governments. The International Law Commission, a subsidiary organ of the Assembly, draws up draft treaties which may be utilized as working documents at such conferences. This method does not differ fundamentally from die normal procedures of creating international law, since, in substance, it involves die drafting and signing of treaties. However, the General Assembly has, at least potentially, other means (the study of which is die subject of this article), which have not been fully utilized and die use of which would perhaps permit a liberalization of the creative process of developing and codifying international law. Here we shall examine, in general terms, only one of tiiese, i.e., die possibilities and limitations of purely declarative codes of customary rules adopted by the General Assembly as means of discharging that organ's responsibilities.

The first indications of Moscow's willingness to share its technological know how in nuclear science with other countries appeared on January 18, 1955. On that date, the Council of Ministers of the USSR published a declaration to the effect that, “attributing great importance to the use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes, the Soviet government has decided to render scientific, technical and production aid to other states in setting up experimental bases for developing research in nuclear physics and in utilizing atomic energy for peaceful purposes.”

Listed below is the membership of UN bodies for 1961. Unless otherwise noted, membership expires on December 31 of the year indicated.

The first part of the fifteenth session of the General Assembly met at UN Headquarters from September 20 through December 20, 1960, when it was adjourned. The second part of the session was to open on March 7, 1961. At the opening plenary meeting, Mr. Frederick R. Boland (Ireland) was elected President of the session, having obtained 46 votes out of a possible 80. At the same meeting, the Assembly's 864th, the following fourteen countries were admitted to membership in the UN: the Republic of Cameroun, the Togolese Republic, the Malagasy Republic, the Republic of Somalia, the Republic of the Congo (Leopoldville), the Republic of Dahomey, the Republic of the Niger, the Republic of Upper Volta, the Republic of the Ivory Coast, the Republic of Chad, the Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville), the Republic of Gabon, the Central African Republic, and the Republic of Cyprus. At the 876th plenary meeting, the Republics of Senegal and Mali were admitted to membership, as was the Federation of Nigeria at the 893 d meeting, thereby bringing the total membership of the UN to 99. A special report of the Security Council on the subject of the admission to membership of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, considered by the Assembly at its 954th meeting, noted the failure of the Council to recommend Mauritania for admission; the Assembly decided to postpone indefinitely further consideration of the question. At its 895th plenary meeting, the Assembly adopted by a vote of 42 to 34, with 22 abstentions, the recomementation contained in the report of the General Committee that the Assembly reject the request of the Soviet Union for the inclusion in its agenda of the question of the representation of China in the UN, and decided not to consider at its fifteenth session any proposals to exclude the representatives of the government of the Republic of China (Nationalist) or to seat representatives of the government of the People's Republic of China (Communist). With regard to the representation in the UN of the Congo (Leopoldville), the General Assembly, at its 924th meeting, adopted by 53 votes to 24, with 19 abstentions, the draft resolution recommended by the Credentials Committee in its report; the Assembly thereby accepted the credentials issued by the head of state (President Joseph Kasavubu) and communicated by him to the President of the Assembly.

The Security Council devoted its 913th–920th meetings to a consideration of the current situation in the Congo. The Council had before it a report by the Secretary-General regarding the arrest and subsequent treatment of Mr. Patrice Lumumba.and a statement from the government of the Soviet Union concerning the Congo situation, as well as requests to present their views from several delegations not members of the Council. All these requests were granted. Referring to the statement of the Soviet delegate raising the question of the role of the UN in the Congo, and to his own note dealing with the arrest and detention of Mr. Lumumba, the Secretary-General opened the discussion by presenting his views on a number of aspects of the situation. Reminding the Council that UN troops had been sent into the Congo to protect life and property, he assured the delegates: 1) that the UN personnel there had maintained a strict neutrality in relation to all domestic political problems; 2) that, since the UN Force had been requested to assume functions in regard to law and order, there was a legal basis for the Secretary-General to concern himself with the observance of generally accepted human rights; and 3) that it was on that basis that he and his special representatives had appealed to the Congolese authorities to apply due process of law. The problem of ascertaining the true functions of the UN in the Congo was derived from the fact that the situation in that country had changed since the original Security Council mandate authorizing the dispatch of a UN Force to the Congo; one of the original objectives, namely, the elimination of Belgian military forces, had been achieved, but the problem of the protection of life and property was still acute, and the army was not, in the Secretary-General's opinion, much more capable of maintaining law and order than when the UN had first entered the Congo. Thus, it was his conclusion that the original reasons for the UN military presence were still valid, and that the withdrawal of the UN Force would result in chaos rendering impossible technical assistance activities, civilian business, and normal political leadership.

The 30th session of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), comprising the 1112th to the 1134th meetings inclusive, was held in Geneva from July 5 to August 5, 1960. In opening the session, Mr. C. W. A. Schurmann (Netherlands), President for i960, drew attention to the meetings at the ministerial level and to the discussion of program appraisals, two innovations which were to constitute a noteworthy experiment of the current session.

South West Africa Cases (Ethiopia v. Union of South Africa and Liberia v. Union of South Africa): On November 4, 1960, applications were filed in the Registry of the Court by Ethiopia and Liberia, instituting separate proceedings against the Union of South Africa. Both applications concerned the mandate for South West Africa and the duties and performance of the Union, as mandatory, thereunder. The applicants alleged that the Union, acting through official bodies created by it to administer the territory, had violated, and was continuing to violate, Article 2 of the mandate and Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations by: 1) arbitrary and unreasonable legislation; 2) the suppression of rights and liberties essential to the orderly evolution of the inhabitants toward self-government; 3) the failure to render annual reports concerning the territory to the General Assembly of the UN; and 4) the exercise of administrative and legislative powers inconsistent with the international status of the territory. The applications contended that the Union of South Africa had thereby modified substantially the terms of the mandate without the consent of the UN, and sought declarations by the Court in accordance with their allegations.

The tenth session of the Conference of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) was held in Rome from October 31 through November 20, 1959. In its review of the world situation and oudook the Conference noted with satisfaction that in 1958 a 4 percent increase in world agricultural production had followed the temporary pause in expansion of the previous year, when harvests in many areas had been reduced by bad weather. The information available to the Conference indicated that world production would again rise in the 1959 season, though the increase would probably not be so great as in 1958, and that variable weather conditions were likely to result in considerable differences between regions and between individual commodities. The Conference expressed concern, however, over the fact that the greater part of the 1958 increase had been contributed by the technically advanced countries and that, apart from a substantial increase reported in mainland China, gains had generally been small in the less developed regions, where a rapid increase of agricultural production was urgently needed. In addition, much of the increase in production had not moved into consumption. The large cereal crops of 1958, especially in the United States, had led to a sharp rise in unsold stocks of wheat and coarse grains, and coffee and sugar stocks had also increased markedly. Thus, despite the existence of surplus stocks, the less developed countries could not afford to import sufficient food to ensure the adequate nutrition of their rapidly growing populations, and the problems of rural poverty and inadequate food supplies which characterized most of them could be overcome only by a build-up of dieir agricultures and a balanced development of their economies. Another adverse factor affecting the less developed countries had been the recession in economic activity in most of the industrialized countries in the two years since the previous session of the Conference, for the volume of exports of industrial raw materials had fallen by some 8 percent in 1958, thus decreasing the needed export earnings of the less developed countries. The Conference also expressed its concern at the slackening in the increase of production in relation to population, particularly in the less developed regions, during the last few years, as the average annual increase in world food production had recently been only about 0.5 percent above the average population growth of 1.6 percent, in contrast to the margin of some 1.5 percent that had been achieved in the earlier part of the postwar period.

The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development announced on September 9, 1960, its first loan to Israel, in the amount of $27.5 million to help build and equip a new sheltered deep-water port at Ashdod, on the Mediterranean Sea. The Bank's loan was to cover all the foreign exchange requirements and part of the local currency costs of die first stage of the project, scheduled to be completed early in 1965; diis stage was to include the construction of about two miles of breakwaters, dredging the port area to proper depths for ocean-going ships, extension of piers to a length adequate for the accommodation of five ships at once, construction of a track and roadway within the port area and rail links outside it to a building quarry, construction of transit sheds, paved open storage areas, port utilities, and auxiliary structures, and the supply of some harbor craft, cranes, and cargo-handling equipment. Amortization on the loan, which was for a term of 25 years and bore interest at the rate of 5¾ percent per annum, was to begin in August 1965.

Two stand-by arrangements were announced by the International Monetary Fund on September 23, 1960, one with the government of El Salvador, authorizing drawings up to the equivalent of $11.25 million for a period of six months in order to strengthen El Salvador's international reserve position prior to the marketing season for the country's cotton and coffee crops, and the other to Haiti, making available the equivalent of $6 million for a one-year period, in support of Haitian currency convertibility. El Salvador had made similar arrangements with the Fund in previous years and had repurchased in full any drawings made under these arrangements. The arrangement with Haiti was to become effective on October 1, 1960, at the expiration of Haiti's current $4-million agreement with the Fund established a year previously in connection with a stabilization program.

The fifteenth session of the Administrative Council of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) was held in Geneva from May 28 to July 2, 1960, under the chairmanship of Mr. Libero Oswaldo de Miranda (Brazil). In pursuance of a decision of the Plenipotentiary Conference of ITU held in Autumn 1959 to increase the part played by the Union in the Expanded Program of Technical Assistance, the Council devoted a considerable part of the session to technical assistance. Discussion revolved around the review of previous procedures applied to ITU technical assistance problems and consideration of procedures that would enable the Union to take a more active part in technical assistance. Since telecommunication projects had been submitted to ITU by the Special Fund, thus making ITU an executive agent of the Fund, the Council passed a resolution outlining the procedure by which ITU should take part in the Fund's activities, along with a directive to the General Secretariat to inform countries of the possibility of recourse to the Fund with a view to financing telecommunication projects. After a long discussion, the Council decided that ITU could also provide technical assistance through the preparation of seminars on technical telecommunication subjects and through the assistance of the Consultative Committees. The Council urged closer contact between the ITU Secretariat and the countries requiring technical assistance in order to specify the needs of those countries and to follow up current expert missions more efficiently. The possibility of regional representation in ITU was considered, but the consensus was that it would be too expensive for the Union at present. Concerning the financing of telecommunication projects, the Council acknowledged the help that might be given by private or international banking concerns and requested the Secretary-General to send to administrations all the information he could assemble on this question.

The twelfth session of the Executive Committee of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) was held in the new headquarters building in Geneva from June 27 to July 15, 1960. The work of the session was divided as usual between two committees, the administrative and financial, and the technical; and reports on over 60 agenda items were prepared by them for decision in plenary meeting.

The second part of the twelfth ordinary session of the Consultative Assembly was held from September 21 to 29, 1960, under the chairmanship of Mr. Per Federspiel (Danish Moderate Liberal). Among the speakers who addressed the Assembly was Mr. J. O. Krag, chairman of the Committee of Ministers and Danish foreign minister. Referring to modern technology, he alleged that the greatest challenge of the times was that of disarmament, and that any new body set up to negotiate on disarmament ought to be accepted, provided its composition guaranteed a realistic approach. Then, concentrating on the problems of European integration, he welcomed the signing of the treaty establishing the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the projected membership of Canada and the United States therein. Its tasks, he pursued, were three-fold: to provide effective consultation for improving the coordination of economic policies; to promote the expansion of world trade; and to assist in the economic development of underdeveloped countries by increasing the magnitude and improving the nature of financial assistance. Another speaker was Mr. Edward Heath, minister of the United Kingdom for European affairs, who, in presenting the United Kingdom's attitude toward European integration, stated that the two main problems were the Commonwealth relationship and the demands of domestic agricultural policy. He expressed the view that it was preferable to concentrate on solving immediate practical difficulties before initiating formal negotiations, and that a solution acceptable to the Commonwealth was undoubtedly possible with further exploration.

On October 17, 1960, the European Parliamentary Assembly, after a debate on trade policy and economic cooperation with third countries, adopted a draft resolution covering such topics as the coordination of trade policies, relations between the European Economic Community (EEC) and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), and policies toward developing countries. In its resolution the Assembly called for an intensification of consultations between member states and the EEC Commission, with a view to increasing participation by the Commission in bilateral negotiations between member states of the Assembly and third countries. With regard to relations between EEC and EFTA, it suggested that the possibility of the EFTA ountries' ultimately joining EEC be examined in the light of the Rome Treaty and the Stockholm Convention, and, with regard to policies toward the developing countries, it proposed the following steps: 1) stabilizing prices of, and reducing import taxes on, raw materials; 2) enlarging quotas for imports from developing countries; and 3) improving export credit terms, as well as increasing financial aid, to enable such countries to pay for imports essential to their development.

An important item of discussion during the Autumn months of 1960 among the members of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) was reported to be the question of association with the European Economic Community (EEC), but the press announced in October a “lack of progress” in resolving the problems encountered. The question was said to have been included in the issues taken up at the second ministerial meeting of the Council, held in Berne, Switzerland, on October 11 and 12, 1960. Mr. Max Petitpierre, president of the Swiss Confederation, reportedly stated in an address to the Council that, even if there was little prospect of an agreement between EEC and EFTA in the immediate future, it was imperative that the two organizations work together, not only for commercial and economic reasons, but also because of the mission that Europe was called on to discharge toward the newly independent countries. Since, however, an acceptable settlement with EEC seemed impossible in the near future, the Council determined that EFTA should proceed with its own plans. In pursuance of this decision, the Ministers decided to establish a consultative committee, representative of all aspects of economic activity, including labor, to advise on all facets of the activity of the Association. Also considered at the meeting was the possibility of an additional 10 percent tariff reduction to take effect as of January 1, 1961, to keep pace with the EEC cut scheduled for that date, but the Council concluded that too little time had elapsed since the first 20 percent tariff reductions on July 1, 1960, to make any modification of the timetable feasible at this time; it resolved, nevertheless, to re-examine the question early in 1961. The Ministers noted with satisfaction that the original tariff cuts had gone into operation without difficulty, and reasserted that the object of EFTA was not the creation of an inward-looking preferential bloc—for example, no restrictions on trade with third countries had been introduced with the creation of the group. EFTA offered to all trading nations, whether producers of industrial or agricultural products, stated the Council, the opportunities of an expanding market.

It was announced by the press in November 1960 that the preparatory committee, which had been considering the aims and structure of the proposed Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to replace the Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC), had completed its report and was planning to transmit it to a conference of ministers of the twenty European and North American nations involved in organizing OECD. One of the most difficult problems in reaching agreement was reportedly the refusal of the United States to accept a definite commitment to coordinate its economic policy with those of the other members. A compromise was finally reached, providing that the convention would: 1) bind members, in making their basic economic decisions—on interest rates, for example—to avoid measures that would endanger other countries; and 2) require members to cooperate closely in carrying out the basic aims of the organization and, when necessary, to take coordinated action. In any case, the organization was to be able to take decisions only by unanimity. The proposed structure of the organization, reported to be similar to that of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, was to include: 1) a Council on which all member states would be represented by permanent delegations; 2) a Council chairman, who would be selected to serve a one-year term and would preside at ministerial sessions of the Council, and two vice chairmen; and 3) a permanent staff headed by a Secretary-General, who would be chosen for a five-year term and would preside at Council sessions attended by the permanent representatives.

The seventeenth session of the contracting parties to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was held in Geneva from October 31 to November 19, 1960, under the chairmanship of Mr. Edmundo Penna Barbosa da Silva (Brazil). One of the main items of discussion was regional economic integration, considered in terms of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), the proposed Latin American free trade area, and the European Economic Community (EEC). Examination of the Stockholm Convention establishing EFTA, begun at the sixteenth session, was resumed, with the contracting parties concluding that the provisions concerning the setting up, within the time limit set forth in the convention, of a free trade area were within the definition of such an area, as contained in Article XXIV of GATT. Delegates felt, however, that there remained some legal and practical issues which could be more fruitfully discussed in the light of experience of the operation of the convention, and thus welcomed the willingness of EFTA members to furnish additional information as the organization evolved. In examining the Montevideo Treaty proposing a Latin American free trade area, delegates reached much the same conclusions. In response to the report on developments within EEC, particularly with regard to tariffs, delegates expressed a desire to receive details on the common agricultural policy of the Community, and raised queries as to the harmful effect of the Community's progressively favorable treatment of the associated territories on the trade of certain outside countries with EEC.

The thirteenth session of the Council of the Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration (ICEM) was held in Geneva, December 1–9, 1960.1 Ambassador Max H. Wershof, permanent representative of Canada to the European Office of the UN in Geneva, was elected chairman.