United Nations Secretary General Kurt Waldheim today for the first time made a direct appeal to the Security Council on the situation in Lebanon. He sent a letter today to Council President Thomas S. Boya of Benin calling the Council’s attention to the conflict in that Arab country. Waldheim did not directly ask for a Council meeting but it was understood here that he hoped the Council would act on behalf of the Christians in Lebanon.
Waldheim said that he is convinced that a cease-fire in Lebanon has now become even more urgent. Given the magnitude of the tragedy and the implication it carries for endangering the wider peace in the Middle East, he said, he feels compelled to draw the Council’s attention to the situation.
Meanwhile, consultations between Security Council members about Waldheim’s letter and a possible meeting of the Council on Lebanon are underway here. A UN spokesman said that Waldheim’s letter was in accordance with Article 99 of the UN Charter by which the Secretary General may bring to the attention of the Council any matter which may threaten international peace and security.
HERZOG ASSAILS LIBYAN STATEMENT
In another development Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Chaim Herzog, met this morning with Waldheim and handed him a letter of protest against a Libyan call for Israel’s destruction during the Security Council meeting last week. The representative of Libya, a member of the Security Council, had stated: “This racist entity in the Middle East must be destroyed and it will be destroyed one day.”
Herzog charged that “this call for the destruction of a member state at a public meeting of the Security Council is in flagrant violation of the UN Charter.” He also said that this statement “only serves to emphasize the serious decline in the moral standing of this important organ of the UN.” Herzog and Waldheim also discussed the situation in the West Bank and according to a UN spokesman, Waldheim expressed “concern and hope that the situation will be normalized.”
PLO WANTS DISCUSSION RESUMED
Meanwhile, at a press conference here, the Palestine Liberation Organization deputy permanent observer at the UN, Zehdi Labib Terzi, said that a letter was sent today to the president of the Security Council, urging him “to assume its responsibility” to resume discussion on Arab demonstrations in Israel and the West Bank. If a veto is cast in the Council, the PLO said, a call will be made for an emergency session of the General Assembly to take over the issue. Observers here said that theoretically such a session of the Assembly could materialize as early as next week.
Although the PLO, which is not a member state, cannot call for a Council meeting, Terzi said the PLO’s call will be backed by other Arab states. He described the riots of the Arabs in Israel as “unarmed uprisings” against the appropriation of land by the Israel government.
In another development concerning the unrest of the Arab population in the West Bank, Mahmoud Riad, Secretary General of the League of Arab States, sent a cable today to Waldheim from Cairo condemning the “wave of barbaric and terroristic measures launched by the Israeli occupying authorities” against the Arab population. Riad called upon Waldheim “to intervene immediately to put an end to the suffering of Arab patriots in the occupied territories.”
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