Cablegram United Nations 325 NEW YORK, 1 August 1946, 9.01 p.m.
SECRET
Security 119.
1. The second meeting of the membership Committee [1] today spent nearly three hours in further discussion whether the Committee should consider statements submitted by states not members of the Security Council. At the outset the Australian representative proposed the following resolution. ‘The Committee will consider written statements of the fact from any of the applicant states or from any member of the United Nations bearing on the applications which the Committee has been instructed to examine.’ He said that it should go without saying that the Committee had powers necessary to carry out functions entrusted to it but since the question had been raised and since one member of the Committee had challenged the Committee’s powers the Committee should decide the general principle in order to avoid repeated discussions of the same point on each application. He supported his resolution with further arguments regarding rights of all members of United Nations to submit information to any of the organisations and the necessity for a complete and objective examination of all facts relevant to the submission.
2. After prolonged debate during which the Soviet representative, helped to some extent by Sobolev, tried various methods of preventing a decision, the Australian resolution was adopted by seven votes to one, Poland, Egypt and Mexico abstaining, the first from sympathy with Soviet and the other two from sheer ignorance.
3. A resolution proposed by China affirming that the Committee had the right to ask information from Governments of member states or applicants was also adopted. It was agreed that both resolutions should be reported to the Security Council, it being left to the Security Council to decide whether or not it wished formally to reject them. This action was taken in deference to the Soviet argument that the Committee did not have the power to decide these matters but in practice it places the onus on the Soviet to call for public debate on refusal to receive evidence.
4. Committee adjourned to Monday afternoon when it will commence examination of Albanian application.
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1 See Documents 18 and 46.
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[AA:A1838 T189, 854/10/14, i]