Soviet disarmame

| ws 23rd session of the United
ais General Assembly is dis-
eng the proposals of the
\ ar Government on certain ur-

Sen measures from stopping the
Bs S drive and for achieving dis-

Mament (July 1, 1968). What is
essence of these measures?

4 at would their implementation

an to mankind?

_The first’ point of the Soviet

Overnment's memorandum is
oh. banning of the nuclear weap-
i S. Since the time this weapon
pupeared, the Soviet Union has

€en invariably coming out for

Nnings.
seth years, the solution of this
lem was ever more urgent
percuse the nuclear weapons

@ improving and their destruc-

ve power increasing.

pes compared with the modern

€gaton hydrogen bombs, the

'st atomic bombs dropped on

pecsbima and Nagasaki seem
a 4 be firecrackers. Nevertheless,
those bombs killed scores of

Beesands of Japanese and de-
| Stroyed thousands of buildings.
stl consequences of that attack
Gs tell. In the first seven months
ay this year alone, 130 people,
: © had lived through the atom-
Be viosion of August, 1945, were
tal up at the Hiroshima Hospi-

of the Atomic Attack Victims.

Orty of them have already pass-

away,

Brest this tragedy should hap-

N again on a larger scale, the
meet Union ‘suggests that an
4 €rnational agreement on ban-
hy the use of nuclear weapons

Culd be concluded.

The peoples of the world ex-
Pressed their will to outlaw nu-
Bae. weapons back in the year

50, in the well-known Stock-
Slm Appeal of the Standing
Ommittee of the World Peace
Ouncils, signed by 500,000,000
People.
= 1967, the Soviet Union sub-

tted to the. 22nd session of the

‘N. General Assembly a draft

| S0nvention on banning the use

x Nuclear weapons. Article one
¥ the Soviet draft said:
‘Each signatory of the present
envention -gives a solemn oath
it to use nuclear weapons, not
reaten its use and not to

“What losses?”

compel other states to use them.”

The course of the discussion
showed that many states are in-
terested in the solution of this
problem. On December 8, 1967,
the U.N. General Assembly ad-
opted a resolution calling upon
all the states to study this prob-
lem on the basis of the Soviet
draft and other documents.
Seventy-seven states voted for
the resolution, nobody voted
against it, and there were 29
abstentions.

And at its 23rd session the
U.N. General Assembly got back
to this problem. The Soviet gov-

ernment proposes to discuss the .

draft convention on the banning
of the use of the nuclear weapons

‘and to exchange opinions on the

convention of an international

conference for the signing of the .

appropriate convention. The
Soviet position is shared by many
states. °

This testifies to the fact that
the problem of banning nuclear
weapons can and should be
solved. :

The Soviet government realizes
that the danger of a nuclear
war will be diminished if meas-
ures are taken for the stopping
of the production of nuclear
weapons, for the reduction and
abolition of its stockpiles. That
is why the Soviet Union suggests
that all the nuclear powers
should start negotiations on the
subject immediately.

The dangerous drive of nuclear
weapons should be stopped. It is
becoming quite senseless be-

cause the world has long been |

oversaturated with nuclear weap-
ons. At the estimates of the well-
known American scientist Linus
Pauling, made several years ago,
the stockpiles of this mass anni-
hilation weapon would suffice to
drop bombs, equal in their de-
structive power to all the bombs
exploded in the course of World
War 2, daily over the period of
146 years.

The nuclear weapons’ drive is a
heavy burden on the peoples for
it makes up a substantial part of
the world military spending which
has now reached an appalling
sum of $225,000,000,000 a year.
Scientists estimated that in the

first. half of the 20th century,

KILLED, ©
WOUNDED /
MISSING

SS

Kirmets in the Bulgarian Trud

nt proposals —

four. billion dollars had. been

spent on military needs. Had.

these colossal means been spent
on peaceful needs, they would
have sufficed for feeding the
globe’s entire population free in
the course of 50 years and to do
away with the housing crisis
everywhere.

Had the nuclear arms race-

been stopped, the money thus.

released could have been used.

already today for peaceful, crea-
tive purposes. j

A complete banning and liqui--

dation of the nuclear weapons
stockpiles under the appropriate:
international control would be a
radical means of preventing a

nuclear war.
—By B. Ganyushkin

Novosti Press

CONFERENCE UNITY

And thus ended a phenome-
nal conference — phenomenal
because of its pace, its inten-
sity, its bitter fighting and its
transcendant unity.

Montreal Star

WOWIE!
In 1917 the Bolshevik Revo-
lutuion was masterminded from

a.girl’s school in Leningrad; in.

1968 revolution for North Ame-
rica-was plotted in a classical
school in the Montreal suburb

of Longeuil.
Peter Worthington

ODD SPOT

A 100th birthday celebration
is set at a convent in Monroe,
Michigan for Sister Hortense.
Nuns wearing short habits are
not invited.

“1 don't. like those. short
habits the sisters are wearing
—they're kilts,” she said firmly.

One of the younger nuns re-
ported Sister Hortense probab-
ly wouldn't care for the English
Mass either, but she’s a bit
hard of hearing and thinks it is
‘still celebrated in Latin.

- expressed by the participants was at all times a

‘and anarchy. They were vocal, they were abu-

to divert the conference away from its goals.

“met will become more menacing as the govern-

JM boul Lo im

Hemispheric Conference

We are still too close to the event to fully
rasp the significance of the ‘Hemispheric Con-
erence. This continent has never seen anything

like it before and the Montreal meeting will
stand as a watershed in the movement of the
peoples of the Americas for peace, independence
and freedom. Out of the diversity of experience
conditions of struggle and social and political
viewpoints came a unity that reached an emo-
tional climax at the last session, with the spon-
taneous demonstrations, the cheers, and frater-.
nity that developed in the huge throng,

There were many problems and shortcomings
with the conference, and there are man lessons
to be learnt, yet all the difficulties pale beside .
the achievements of the weekend. The confer-
ence represented not only the complexity of this
hemisphere, the many-hued. viewpoints, it also
was a demonstration of the corruption of Ame-
rican society, and the stranglehold that Ameri-
can imperialism holds over .the lives and des-
tinies of the peoples of the Americas. The anger,
passion, and indeed the frustration that was.

live fact, just as the hope and inspiration repre-
sented by the Vietnamese could galvanize the
conference as one could. see their struggle
against the common enemy. In the whole kalei-
discope there was thus the vision of hope and
struggle and victory. Unity on Vietnam was
the common factor and unbreakable bond. The
Montreal Declaration was a unanimous voice of
the conference.

There were those who chose either: to divert

the conference, or to try to smash it in mayhem

sive, as they picked on the shortcomings and
the misunderstandings that at times developed.
With pseudo revolutionary cliches and ludicrous
slogans they tried to pit black against while and

They failed in this, but the confusion they man-
aged to develop allowed the hostile press, on
the one hand to have a field day in their aim to
distort the conference, and demonstrated a prob-
lem of ideology and understanding that. unless

ment grows.

There is a polarization taking place in society
as the crisis of imperialism deepened. The Hem-
ispheric Conference was a reflection of this
process. While support for the struggle for
peace in Vietnam sparked the conference, and
was the well spring of the movement behind it,
the movement in support of the Vietnamese
could only be seen in unity with the social and
political issues that are part of the fibre of this
tortured American continent. .

The essential oneness of the struggles of the
peoples of this world enriched the understand-
ing not. only of the problem, but also of the
diversified forces that can unite to force social
change. Montreal on the last weekend of Nov-
ember 1968, was an unforgettable experience.
_ As the conference ended one could sense that
it was only the beginning. .

“No, it was a hat 1 wanted not a mortgage !”

PACIFIC TRIBUNE-DECEMBER 6, 1968—Page 3