Dr. Ralph Bunche, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for his service as mediator at the 1949 Israeli-Arab armistice negotiations at Rhodes said yesterday that he did not think the Middle East conflict was “insoluble.”
” It is not insoluble but of course it is highly emotional. You must break it down into its components,” Dr. Bunche told a panel of newsmen on the ABC “Issues and Answers” television program. He said “The biggest problem is that of refugees — it can be solved but it will take a lot of money. So too with the matter of a guarantee of secure boundaries — the Big Powers are willing to make these guarantees,” he said. According to Dr. Bunche, “The problem here is to get the definition and agreement on boundaries. Boundaries are the most difficult, but the questions are not insoluble.” He thought that Ambassador Gunnar V. Jarring, of Sweden, the United Nations special peace envoy for the Middle East, could bring about a Mideast settlement “if any man can do it.” He said the world must realize that there was “an active war in the Middle East, not just incidents.
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