By April 17, 2008 Read More →

New Report on Palestine, Associated Press, San Francisco Chronicle, Mar. 8, 1948.

Warren R. AustinU.S. Reported Ready for Conciliation

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NEW YORK, March 7 (AP)-The United States was reported ready tonight to seek big power agreement on a new conciliation effort in Palestine.

This report came from a member of the U. S. delegation on the eve of secret talks which will begin here tomorrow. Top diplomats of Russia, France, China and the United States will take part.

It was learned that British Colonial Secretary Arthur Creech Jones left New York for London Friday following the council session. British sources described his departure as routine.

The consultations were proposed Friday by the Security Council, which asked the five great powers to bring back recommendations on the Holy Land problem by March 15. Britain declined to take part in the discussions.

The U. S. spokesman said no formal proposal had been drafted on the conciliation question up to tonight. He said, however, chief U. S. Delegate Warren R. Austin felt the big power talks should deal primarily with the question of “peaceful settlement.”

Any proposal on conciliation would raise a delicate point between the United States and Russia as well as a controversial legal issue.

The original U. S. resolution on big power consultations provided that they try to settle Jewish-Arab differences by direct negotiations. This provision, however, failed by one vote to win approval.

Russia was one of the five countries abstaining. Soviet Delegate Andrel A. Gromyko contended conciliatory efforts would only prolong the discussions. France and China voted along with the U. S. for conciliation.

The Jewish Agency and other Zionist groups interpreted the council’s action as ruling out any further conciliation attempts. But a U. S. spokesman took the view that the big powers still were free to consider such a move, even though the council refused to direct them to do so.

Dean Rusk, head of the State Department’s U. N. Division, was in Washington for discussions with Administration officials on a detailed U. S. plan of action. He was due to arrive in New York tonight with instructions for the delegation.

Meanwhile, an increasing air of secrecy developed. The United Nations adopted a hands-off policy and said the consultations were strictly a big power affair. It was announced that no U. N. secretariat personnel will attend the meetings.

It still was undecided whether the participating delegations will be free to give the press any information or whether newsmen will be admitted to Russia’s new Park Avenue offices where the meetings will be held.

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