Skip to main content

Historical documents

278 Department of External Affairs to Australian Delegation, United Nations

Cablegram UNY461 CANBERRA, 6 December 1946

MOST IMMEDIATE SECRET

Your UN.902. [1]

Your reports do not indicate attitude which will be adopted at
Plenary by United Kingdom, New Zealand and other Members of
British Commonwealth. We can see no real objection to French-
Brazilian [2] proposal particularly if amended in ways suggested
in UN.890. [3] It would be most unfortunate to offend Indians by
voting against unamended text merely because of relatively minor
objections. You could abstain but voting for that text should not
embarrass South Africa. As there will be no time to report on
views of other members of British Commonwealth you should use
discretion and if possible act with them in way which would be
acceptable to Indians.

1 Dispatched 4 December, it had reported a request by India that
Australia not vote in plenary session against the French-Mexican
draft resolution (see Document 268, note 2) on the treatment of
Indians in South Africa.

2 This presumably should read 'French-Mexican'.

3 Dispatched 3 December, it had reported that the United States
and Sweden would co-sponsor an amendment to the French-Mexican
draft calling for an International Court of Justice opinion on the
jurisdiction aspect of the issue, and that the Australian
delegation proposed to vote for the amendment but, if the
amendment failed, against the draft resolution.


[AA:A1838/2, 852/10/2, i]
Last Updated: 11 September 2013
Back to top