The Question of Morocco and the Tunisian Question were inscribed on the First Committee's agenda in that order. Although they were discussed separately, the discussion overlapped at many points and the Chairman encouraged those who wished to do so to speak on both items at the same time. The thirteen Afro-Asian Delegations, which had once again requested that these questions be discussed at the 8th Session of the General Assembly, did not object to this procedure, but, for their part, they treated the two items as separate debates, although using the Moroccan resolutions as a means of testing how far the Committee and the Assembly might be prepared to go in adopting a resolution on Tunisia.

For these reasons we propose to cover these two items in one final report.

Inscription on the Agenda

The 8th Session of the General Assembly began less than two weeks after the Security Council had decided, after a lengthy debate, not to inscribe on its agenda the Moroccan item dealing with the deposing of the Sultan. There was, however, no question in the minds of most delegations about inscribing the Moroccan and Tunisian questions on the Assembly's agenda and even the French Delegation raised no objection to their inscription. The Assembly, therefore, decided on September 17th, without debate, to include both questions on its agenda and refer them to the First Committee.

It was more by accident than design that the First Committee decided to take up the Moroccan and Tunisian questions first. As will be explained in the final report on the Korean item,? the United States Delegation and others wished to avoid if at all possible any further discussion in the Assembly of the composition of the Korean Political Conference, at least in the early stages of the Assembly. For various reasons it was not convenient to take up other items first and as the French, knowing that the Arabs were not quite ready, had no objection to an early discussion of Tunisia and Morocco, these were the first items discussed by the First Committee. With Sir Zafrulla Khan away from New York until mid October, the Arabs would have preferred to seE their items discussed at a later stage, but after all they had said in the Security Council in August and September about the urgency of a United Nations debate on these questions, they could not very well protest too strongly.

Arab Delays

They could, however -- and did -- delay the progress of the debate in the First Committee by not presenting a resolution until October 9, the third day of the Committee's debate on this subject. Moreover, even after they had submitted their resolution, it was difficult for the Chairman to get speakers to come forward and those Arabs who did, spoke at such length and with so many repetitions of historical and legal arguments, and of current developments that it was quite obvious they wished to fill in time. The First Committee's debates on these items lasted for three weeks, and the Tunisian item was not finally completed in Plenary until November 11. As far as we can tell, the Arabs' motives were:

(a) to enable Sir Zafrulla Khan to take part in the debate;

(b) to have their items discussed by the First Committee for as long as possible in order to dramatize their cause and sustain the morale of the nationalists in French North Africa; and

(c) to negotiate among themselves and with other groups as to what amendments or alternative resolutions might, if necessary, be put forward with a better chance of adoption than their own resolution.

The Afro-Asian Resolutions

Both Afro-Asian resolutions did, indeed, go farther than the General Assembly was in any mood to accept. On Morocco, their resolution provided for the Assembly to:

(a) Recommend that the existing state of martial law and all other exceptional measures in Morocco should be terminated, that political prisoners should be released and that all public liberties should be restored;

(b) recommend that democratic representative institutions for the people of Morocco should be established through free elections on the basis of universal suffrage;

(c) recommend that all necessary steps should be taken to ensure, within five years, the complete realization by the people of Morocco of their rights to full sovereignty and independence; and

(d) request the Secretary-General to communicate with the French Government with a view to the implementation of the resolution and to report to the General Assembly at its ninth session.

The Afro-Asian programme, in other words, was to attempt to get the Assembly to fix a specific goal of complete Moroccan independence within five years, the immediate removal of repressive measures and the establishment of democratic representative institutions in which there would be no provision for any special economic or political rights of the French "colons".

Having failed in Committee to win the support of even a simple majority for their Moroccan resolution, the Afro-Asian Delegations tabled a somewhat milder resolution on Tunisia on October 22. The main difference was that the Tunisian resolution did not attempt to fix a target date for the achievement of complete independence but recommended that negotiations should be undertaken without delay with Representatives of a Tunisian Government established through free elections held on the basis of universal suffrage and enjoying the necessary guarantees of freedom, with a view to enabling the Tunisian people to exercise all the powers arising from their legitimate rights to full sovereignty.

As it proved later, this was also too much for the Assembly. Not only did the Tunisian resolution imply that only the Tunisians (and not the French) possessed rights in the country, but it contained an implied criticism of the French Government for its failure to pursue the objectives of last year's resolution.

French Tactics

In the expectation that the Arabs would try to take the Assembly farther than it wanted to go, the French Delegation this year changed their tactics. Last year they had, with some reservations, encouraged or allowed certain Latin American and other delegations to put forward a moderate resolution recognizing the rights of both parties and urging them to continue negotiations towards developing free political institutions and self-government. It was clear early in the debate at the present session that the Assembly would not be prepared to go beyond these rather general exhortations to the parties concerned. The French Delegation therefore took the calculated risk this year of discouraging any compromise proposals in the hope that, left to themselves, the Arabs would be incapable of proposing anything sufficiently moderate to be adopted by the Assembly by the necessary two-thirds majority in Plenary. By a narrow margin, their tactics were successful. The General Assembly did not adopt any resolution on either Tunisia or Morocco at the present session.

Like last year, however, the French Delegation refused to take any part in the public proceedings of the Assembly concerned with the discussion of the Tunisian and Moroccan items and absented themselves from Plenary and Committee while these debates were continuing. When the First Committee commenced its consideration of the Moroccan question, the Chairman read a letter from the representative of France in which he informed the Committee that the French Delegation considered that such discussion represented outright intervention by the United Nations in matters which were essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of France. A resolution promptly submitted by Pakistan, requesting the Government of France to reconsider its decision and assist the Committee to come to a fair and equitable solution to the question, was withdrawn the next day when it became apparent that it would not have the unanimous support of the Committee. Although the Canadian Delegation would not have wished to have asked the French Government in this way to reconsider a decision it had just taken, we, nevertheless, expressed our regret later in the debate at French non-participation, and many other delegations did likewise.

With the French Delegation absent and as no attempt was being made by countries sympathetic with France to work out a mild resolution similar to last year's, a certain lassitude and air of unreality settled over the whole proceedings of the First Committee. A series of lengthy presentations of the Afro-Asian case, going into the legal, historical, political and social aspects in detail were made one after another, but the only real debate that developed was over the question of competence.

Competence

The delegations of the colonial powers, headed by the United Kingdom and Australia, argued as before that Article 2 (7) of the Charter clearly prevented the Assembly from discussing matters which fall within the domestic jurisdiction of France, for by treaty the foreign affairs of both Tunisia and Morocco are conducted exclusively by the French Government. The dispute was, therefore, between France and herself and was not an international matter in any sense. Moreover, as Sir Gladwyn Jebb argued with some force, it was unwise and perhaps dangerous for the Assembly to try to draw a distinction between competence to discuss and competence to intervene. Unless intervention of some kind was intended, discussion was aimless. In certain circumstances in which there was a highly explosive situation in a colonial area, any discussion might in fact touch off disturbances and thus prove to be a most effective form of intervention, whether so intended or not. Various speakers drew attention to the fact that previous Assembly discussion of these questions had been accompanied by violence in both Tunisia and Morocco.

The Arabs met this argument with more moderation and skill than in previous years. Far from denying the importance and validity of Article 2 (7), they accepted it but argued that what was at issue in Tunisia and Morocco was not a domestic matter. The very existence of international treaties which recognize the Sovereignty of Tunisia and Morocco proved this point, they said, and the fact that France had been progressively encroaching upon the sovereignty of these two countries must not allow the colonial powers to shelter behind the provisions of the treaties concerned which permitted the French Government to conduct foreign affairs on behalf of the Tunisian and Moroccan sovereigns.

In addition to their legal arguments, the Arab and Asian speakers cited as precedents several examples of items which the General Assembly had discussed at the request of the United Kingdom, Australia and other colonial delegations, items which they maintained fell within the area proscribed by Article 2 (7). For example, there had been the question of the Soviet wives of British subjects, the violations of the human rights provisions of the peace treaties with the Eastern European satellites, and the persecution of Cardinal Mindszenty³⁴ and others. The colonial powers could not adopt one interpretation of the Charter when it concerned items affecting the Soviet Union and another interpretation on items affecting France or themselves. If the human rights provisions of the Charter (Articles 55 and 56) were valid in one case, they had at least equal validity in the other. If it was proper for the Assembly to discuss violations of human rights by the Polish Government in its treatment of Polish citizens, it was surely proper for the Assembly to discuss violations of human rights by a French Government affecting not Frenchmen but Tunisians and Moroccans -- peoples whose sovereignty had been recognized by international treaties between France and these territories.

The colonial powers could only answer this argument indirectly by pointing out that the Assembly, with the concurrence of the Afro-Asian group, had for some time been accepting reports from the French Government in respect of Tunisia and Morocco under Article 73 (e) of the Charter. Tunisia and Morocco had therefore been accepted by the United Nations as non-self-governing territories. The Afro-Asian group could not, therefore, base their case on the assumption of the sovereignty of Tunisia and Morocco. If Article 2 (7) was, as they maintained, applicable, then the only exception which could justify the Assembly in discussing the affairs of these territories was if a threat to international peace and security existed. It might be true that internal peace and security in Tunisia and Morocco were upset, but it could hardly be argued that there was a threat to international peace.

The Arabs replied that the Charter had to be read as a whole and that Articles 10, 11 and 14, as well as 55 and 56, had to be taken into consideration in addition to Article 2 (7). Where there was an apparent contradiction between Articles of the Charter, the Assembly, in the absence of a ruling from the International Court, had to decide whether it was competent to discuss, and if so, what action, if any, it was competent to take. If this argument were not admitted, however, they maintained that there was sufficient grounds for believing that the situation in North Africa might very soon become a real threat to international peace and security to justify an Assembly discussion; and they pointed to the fruits of French colonial policy in Indochina.

Although the United States Government under the new Administration were attaching greater importance than their predecessors to Article 2 (7), the United States Delegation could not ignore the provisions of the Treaties [of] Algeciras, Fez, Bardo, and the Convention of La Marsa. Caught in a difficult legal and political position, Mr. Lodge sought to side-step the issue by maintaining, in his statement in the First Committee on the Moroccan question, that the Committee was not a Court and could therefore not be expected to hear evidence and sit in judgment on conflicting points of view in such cases. It was a statement that their Delegation soon found themselves saddled with, when it came to the bacteriological warfare item in which they might in other circumstances have liked the First Committee to behave as if it were a Court. At any rate, the argument gave the United States Delegation an excuse for saying very little in the subsequent debate on these two items, and, behind the scenes, for being of considerable assistance to the French in discouraging any compromise resolution which, with United States support, might easily have been adopted.

The Canadian position was as stated last year. Despite Sir Gladwyn Jebb's arguments concerning the artificiality of the distinction between competence to discuss and competence to intervene, Mr. Côté maintained that the distinction in practice was a useful one, especially in the absence of any judgment by the International Court.

Substance

Turning now to the debate on the substance of the issue between France and her North African territories, it must be admitted that no delegation really made a case in support of French policy. Those who clearly supported the French argued against the Arabs and Asians on legal grounds of competence rather than of substance. It was therefore left for the "middle of the road" delegations (such as the Scandinavian group, New Zealand, Canada and some Latin American delegations) to defend the position which the Assembly had taken at the last session in favour of continuing efforts for negotiations between the French on the one hand and the Tunisians and Moroccans on the other with a view to the achievement of self-determination and self-government of those peoples.

The Arab-Asian Case

Although the Arab and Asian Representatives were slow and repetitive in what they said, most of their case was largely unassailable. Starting from the objectives and principles defined by the Assembly last year in Resolutions 611 and 612, they had no difficulty in showing that in both Tunisia and Morocco, the French Government, far from proceeding in the direction indicated by the Assembly, had on the whole been going the other way. Negotiations between the parties with a view to bringing about self-government and the development of free political institutions in an atmosphere of goodwill, mutual confidence and respect, had not taken place. Instead, measures of martial law had been continued or intensified, the Sultan of Morocco had been deposed by what was pretty obviously a group of French stooges, more Nationalist leaders had been jailed and both territories had been kept in order only by the use of French troops and strong police methods.

Historically, Arab speakers painted a picture of progressive French "colonisation" which had been going on ever since French armies had forced the rulers of Tunisia and Morocco to sign the treaties and agreements already mentioned. Under the guise of "reforms" and "pacification", the French had in fact been establishing an oligarchy of "colons" who were deriving about twenty percent of the economic benefits of an administration ninety-five percent financed by taxes levied on the Tunisian and Moroccan people. In the cultural sphere, the French had deliberately followed a policy of encouraging minorities, such as the Berbers in Morocco, to relearn their forgotten language and customs in order to wean them away from Arabic and Islam. In other areas, the reactionary "Brotherhoods" played their role of encouraging superstition and secretly assisting the French. One faction was played off against another and divisions created artificially in the classic manner of colonial rule. Indeed, after a brief experiment on more liberal lines had culminated in the reversal of policy in December, 1951, French policy was now undistinguishable from that of the "colons" who had always exercised such a large measure of control over successive governments in Paris in regard to their North African policies.

A few speakers from Asia and the Middle East granted that the French had developed North Africa economically and that from the point of view of wealth and welfare, the territories had certainly benefited from French rule. But as Sir Zafrulla Khan of Pakistan once again said most forcefully, for colonial peoples, "good government can be no substitute for self-government".

Canadian Position

As the Canadian representative, Mr. Côté, pointed out in the Moroccan debate in the First Committee on October 16, the historical experience of the Canadian people pointed to the value of peaceful evolution towards self-government; revolution is bound to make future collaboration between the parties difficult, if not impossible, regardless of the final outcome. Mr. Côté also drew from Canadian experience the usefulness, if not the necessity, of maintaining in this interdependent world economic, cultural and even political ties between the newly emerging state and its former protector. At the same time Canada recognized as a principal condition to the achievement of self-government, he said, the creation of competent administrative services, a practical understanding of democratic processes and insofar as possible a viable economy. Again from our own experience, he said, Canadians were particularly conscious of the necessity for the full protection of the rights of minorities.

Although Mr. Côté did not say so in his statement, the Canadian Delegation felt privately that two major difficulties of the Afro-Asian resolutions were that they seemed to assume:

(a) that only the Moroccans or the Tunisians had any rights in these territories; and

(b) that there should be no provision in the constitution of an independent Tunisia or Morocco for the protection of the political and economic rights of the large number of French "colons" who had such a big economic stake in both territories.

By attempting to define, in categorical and critical terms, action which should now be taken by France to give her North African territories complete freedom and sovereignty, the Arab Asian countries were, the Canadian Delegation felt, going further than it would be appropriate or useful for the Assembly to go in present circumstances.

Disappointment with United States position

A recurring theme, especially in the statements of the able Syrian Representative, Dr. Zeineddine, was his disappointment over the attitude of the United States Delegation. At one point in the Moroccan debate in the First Committee he remarked bitterly that if there were more Communists in French North Africa, the United States attitude would have been different. Although there were few Communists there today, he warned that North African nationalism could not indefinitely be put off and ignored by the United Nations. If Asian and Arab attempts to gain national liberation for the North African peoples who had not already achieved it were frustrated, these peoples could not be expected to wait passively forever. They would inevitably turn to more violent methods, to revolution rather than evolution. Indochina showed them the way. The United States might think that it was keeping France as a firm ally by supporting her in North Africa for reasons of political expediency in the interests of European and Western defence. This might turn out to be a short-sighted view, for it was prejudicing the friendship and goodwill, not only of the people of North Africa but of all their comrades and co-religionists from North Africa to Indonesia.

A Round Table Conference?

If the Arab and Asian delegations were disappointed by the negative attitude adopted by the United States and most of her allies, it can at least be said that the disappointment was mutual. From the protracted and discursive debate, only one suggestion of a constructive nature was made by one of the delegations sponsoring these items, and it was abandoned almost as soon as it had been put forward. On the first day of the debate on the Moroccan question, Mr. Amjad Ali³⁵ of Pakistan proposed that the French and Moroccans might usefully take a leaf out of the book of Anglo-Indian relations and convene a Round Table Conference of representatives of the major political parties on both sides. Mr. Amjad Ali referred to the London Conferences held on similar lines in the early 1930's which had paved the way for the constitutional reforms of 1935 and eventually for independence. He coupled his proposal with an appeal to the French to return to the Committee and when this appeal was ignored the Afro-Asian group apparently decided that there would be no point, in the absence of the French, in pursuing the idea further and it was not mentioned again.

Compromise Proposals

Instead, it was left to others outside the Afro-Asian group to come forward with compromise proposals. In the case of the Moroccan item, several Latin American delegations, including Mexico, were active in the formulation of an alternative resolution but hesitant, in view of French and United States opposition, about tabling it. Finally the Bolivian Delegation, for reasons perhaps not unconnected with their interest in securing Arab votes for their candidate for the forthcoming elections to the International Law Commission, tabled a compromise resolution on October 16. This resolution, in its operative part, asked the Assembly to renew its appeal for the reduction of tension in Morocco, again expressing its confidence and hope that the free political institutions of the people of Morocco will be developed in conformity with the Charter. As amended by India, Indonesia and Burma, the final phrase of the resolution was changed to read: "urges that the right of the people of Morocco to free democratic political institutions be ensured"; in addition, a fifth paragraph was added to the preamble: "recognizing the right of the people of Morocco to complete self-determination in conformity with the Charter". As the Indian representative in the First Committee said when introducing his amendments, they represented the "irreducible minimum" of Assembly action which the sponsors of the item could accept.

Voting on Moroccan resolutions

These Indian amendments (and two or three others of less consequence) were carried in Committee against the votes of the United States, the "old" Commonwealth and Western European delegations, with the exception of the Scandinavian delegations who supported them. The amended Bolivian resolution was then adopted on October 19 by a similar division, the vote on the resolution as a whole being 31 in favour, 18 against (the United States, "old" Commonwealth, Benelux, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama) with 9 abstentions (Brazil, El Salvador, Greece, Israel, Paraguay, Peru, Turkey, Uruguay and Venezuela).

It should here be explained that the Indian amendments to the Bolivian resolution were not submitted until the last moment before the First Committee voted on the Bolivian resolution. The Indians and the delegations they represented had not wished to table their amendments to the milder Bolivian resolution until the Committee had voted on the Afro-Asian resolution. When this had been defeated, as had been generally expected, by a vote of 22 in favour, 28 against (including Canada), and 9 abstentions, the Afro-Asian group felt free to try to secure the adoption of a milder resolution but one nevertheless reasonably satisfactory from their point of view.

The voting in Plenary on the amended Bolivian resolution took place on November 3rd and followed a similar course, with the important exception that the United States and Canada abstained instead of voting against the fifth paragraph of the preamble ("recognizing the right of the people of Morocco to complete self-determination"), and Canada also abstained on the operative paragraph of the resolution. The Canadian decision to abstain on the fifth paragraph of the preamble may have tipped the scales in the United States Delegation's change of vote on this paragraph. As the operative paragraph of the resolution was defeated by 32 to 22 with 5 abstentions, a two-thirds majority being required for adoption, the resolution as a whole was defeated, for, under Rule 89, when the operative part of a resolution is defeated the preamble alone cannot be put to the vote.

For the record, the voting by paragraphs on the amended Bolivian resolution in Committee and Plenary, showing how the Canadian Delegation (indicated by "C") voted in each case, is given below:

Voting on the Tunisian Resolution

Having failed to secure the necessary two-thirds majority needed for the adoption of a resolution on Morocco, the Afro-Asian group not only tabled a milder resolution on Tunisia in the First Committee, as has already been described, but subsequently encouraged the Delegation of Iceland to table amendments which were intended to secure the adoption of their resolution when it finally came before the Plenary on November 11th. The First Committee had passed the Afro-Asian resolution on Tunisia on October 26 by a vote of 29 to 22 (including Canada) with 5 abstentions, after deleting the second and third parts of the first operative paragraph. The Icelandic amendments deleted the third paragraph of the preamble and both operative paragraphs, substituting in place of the first operative paragraph: "recommends that negotiations between France and Tunisia be undertaken to ensure the realization by the people of Tunisia of their right to self-determination".

The above Icelandic paragraph was adopted by 32 in favour, 16 against (the United Kingdom, Australia, South Africa, Benelux, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Haiti, Honduras, Israel, Nicaragua, Panama and Paraguay) with 11 abstentions (Canada, the United States, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Greece, New Zealand, Peru, Turkey and Venezuela). The other two Icelandic amendments deleting the third paragraph of the preamble and the second paragraph of the operative part carried by 39 in favour (including Canada), 4 against and 10 abstentions (including the United States which abstained even on the deletion of a paragraph it had publicly opposed).

On the resolution as a whole as amended the vote was 31 in favour, 18 against (the 16 mentioned above plus the United States and Turkey) and 10 abstentions (including Canada). The amended resolution on Tunisia therefore also failed of adoption under the two-thirds rule.

Again for the record, the voting by paragraphs in Committee was as follows (the Plenary vote was different because of the Iceland amendments already analyzed):

Conclusions

By a slim margin, the French "calculated risk", of discouraging compromise proposals in the hope that the Assembly might adopt no resolution on either Morocco or Tunisia this year, paid off. Had the United States not adopted such a negative attitude to the whole discussion, it is quite clear that the Assembly would have passed resolutions on both subjects. The United States, Canada, and other friends of France preferred this year to leave last year's resolutions on the books, rather than adopting what the Arabs might well have interpreted as a "watering down" of the position taken by the Assembly last year.

Although furious with the United States Delegation in particular and with the West in general for what Zafrulla Khan termed the shocking gap between what we practice and what we preach in regard to self-determination of peoples, the Arabs were nevertheless able to claim a "moral victory". Both resolutions secured the support of a substantial majority of the Assembly, although not quite the two-thirds needed for adoption.

Whether or not the Arabs return to the charge next year will probably depend in large measure on what the French Government do in the intervening months. With a new Resident-General already installed in Tunisia and a favourable atmosphere for real negotiations created by the lifting of many repressive measures of martial law after the Assembly had concluded its debate, and with the prospective appointment of a new French Resident-General in Morocco, the French now have their best chance in recent years to redeem their position in North Africa by negotiating genuine reforms in both Tunisia and Morocco. That is the sincere hope of those delegations which supported the French this year. For it is all too apparent that the West has little to be proud of in the past record of French administration in French North Africa and much to fear if French policy is not radically and rapidly liberalized.

APPENDIX "B"

A/2526

Note: The operative paragraph of this resolution failed by a vote of 32 in favour to 22 opposed, with 5 abstentions (including Canada) to secure the required two-thirds majority in the vote in Plenary.

THE QUESTION OF MOROCCO

The General Assembly,

Having considered the question of Morocco proposed by fifteen Member States in document A/2406,

Recalling General Assembly resolution 612 (VII) of 19 December 1952,

Considering that the motives and objectives of that resolution had and continue to have the merit of recognizing the necessity for the development of the free political institutions of the people of Morocco,

Considering that the fact that this item has been included in the agenda of the General Assembly at its eighth session indicates that those objectives have not yet been fulfilled,

Recognizing the right of the people of Morocco to complete self-determination in conformity with the Charter,

Renews its appeal for the reduction of tension in Morocco and urges that the right of the people of Morocco to free democratic political institutions be ensured.

APPENDIX "C"

A/2530

Note: This resolution as a whole as amended failed by a vote of 31 in favour, 18 opposed, with 10 abstentions (including Canada) to secure the required two-thirds majority in the vote in Plenary.

THE TUNISIAN QUESTION

The General Assembly,

Having considered the question of Tunisia, as proposed by fifteen Member States in document A/2405,

Recalling its resolution 611 (VII) of 17 December 1952,

Noting that the objectives of this resolution have not yet been achieved,

Desirous of creating the necessary conditions for the restoration between France and Tunisia of normal relations based on the principle of equality of rights of nations large and small,

Convinced that full effect should be given to the sovereignty of the people of Tunisia by the exercise, as early as possible, of their legitimate rights to self-determination and self-government in conformity with the Charter,

1. Recommends that all necessary steps be taken to ensure the realization by the people of Tunisia of their right to full sovereignty and independence;

2. Requests the Secretary-General to transmit the present resolution, together with the record of the proceedings, to the French Government and to report to the General Assembly at its ninth session.