Arabs Attack “big Three” Policy of Balance of Arms in Middle East

The United State, Britain and France were severely attacked here today by the head of the Syrian delegation, Ahmed Shukairy, for their stand that there must be a balance of arms between the Arab countries and Israel.

Addressing the Political and Security Committee of the UN General Assembly, the Syrian delegate announced the Arab states will not tolerate “intervention” by the Western powers in the Czech-Egyptian arms deal, nor in any other matter concerning acquisition of arms by the Arab governments. Mr. Shukairy said he did not see how the Western powers could take the position that there should be a balance of arms in the Middle East. This area was represented in the Assembly by sovereign states, which were not under “tutelage” any longer, he argued. The defense of the Middle East was the concern of these states, he added, and they were not prepared to accept intervention.

Mr. Shukairy asked the representatives of the Western powers the following questions: Under what authority are “you entitled to interfere in the plans for the defense of other countries and other peoples,” or to “deal with the balance of arms in the Middle East or other areas in the world,” or to “endeavor to arrest lawful agreements for the shipment of arms” to the Middle East or other areas? Also, “how and when have you been empowered to judge the balance and imbalance of arms” in the Middle East or elsewhere?

It was unthinkable, he continued, for the Western powers to exercise a power they did not possess, to judge a matter not their own, and to act where they were not entitled to act. He did not see why the Middle East should be a particular area for the Western powers to exercise an influence.

Mr. Shukairy went on to charge that the disturbed conditions in the Middle East were “the making” of the Western powers. The USSR, he declared, had not a single military base or a single soldier in the region. It was not the USSR, he said, that had created this “great tragedy” of Palestine. He stressed that his country was not a member of the Soviet bloc. It was determined, however, to “emancipate” the Arab world from the “relics of imperialism, from the vestiges of colonialism and from all manifestations of aggression.” His speech was lauded by Vasily V. Kuznetsov, First Deputy Foreign Minister of the USSR and head of the Soviet delegation at the United Nations.