asked the Minister for External Affairs if he will circulate to Members of the Houses of the Oireachtas the complete text of each of the speeches made by him at the recent meeting of U.N.O. on (a) the withdrawal of forces in Europe; (b) the proposal to discuss the representation of China; (c) Algiers; and (d) any other topic on which he spoke.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Speeches at U.N.O.
Texts of all my speeches in the U.N.O. are already available to Deputies in the Dáil Library. They are contained in the Bulletins of the Department of External Affairs Nos. 380, 381, 382, 383.
I may add in relation to (a) of the Deputy's question that the suggestion for the negotiation of a drawing back of American and Russian forces from both sides of the Russian line of occupation is contained in the discussion on the debate on the Report of the U.N.O. Committee on Hungary, Bulletin No. 380.
(b) The question was whether there should be placed on the agenda for discussion an item entitled "The Representation of China in the United Nations". I voted in favour of having a discussion and what I said can be found in Bulletin No. 383.
(c) The suggestion for self-determination for Algeria was contained in my speech on the general debate on the 30th September, Bulletin No. 382.
Bulletin No. 381 contains a report of my speech welcoming the representatives of the Federation of Malaya to U.N.O.
Will the Minister state upon what date his speech referring to the representations of China and referred to here as being in Bulletin No. 382, was made available?
I have not got the date. It was made available and it has been in the Library and was published in a great number of Irish newspapers in full several weeks ago and before the Fine Gael people made their statement condemning it. There was one newspaper in which it was not published but in which a lot of counter-propaganda against it was published without readers knowing what I said.
Can the Minister state on what date the issue of the 30th September reached the Library, that is No. 382, and will he say what was the date of No. 383 and on what date did that reach the Library?
Those speeches were available to the Deputies and anybody could see them the day after they were made. They were put into the Library as quickly as copies could be made available.
That is not so.
It is so.
It is absolutely not so.
That is so.
It is not so.
They were available and you would not look at them. You would prefer to go to the public condemning them.
I challenge the Minister to say on what date his speech with reference to the representation of China was put into the Library.
It was in the papers here the day after I made it, if the Deputy wanted to read it, but he did not.
Does the Minister expect us to take Government or ministerial statements on important foreign affairs matters from the newspapers?
No, but they were available to the Deputy had he looked for them.
asked the Minister for External Affairs if he will circulate to Members of the Houses of the Oireachtas the complete text of speeches made by Members of the Irish Delegation, other than the Minister for External Affairs, at the recent meeting of U.N.O.
I have asked the U.N. Secretariat for extra copies of the report of the debates on all matters arising at meetings of the General Assembly and its committees. These reports will be placed in the Library of the Oireachtas as soon as they are received.
Does that mean that the preliminary reports in type will be put in there?
As soon as we can get them, yes.
And that we shall not have to wait for the printed issues?
As quickly as we can get them. It takes some time for those reports to reach us. The reports of my speeches are not available in typewritten form but we got them printed and put into the Library.
asked the Minister for External Affairs whether, arising out of a speech delivered by him at the U.N. General Assembly, protests or representations, either official or unofficial, were made to him or his Department either by or on behalf of any foreign government, and, if so, whether he will state the nature and terms of such protests or representations and the governments making them.
I have received no protest from any foreign government arising out of my speeches at U.N. I have had, however, many exchanges of views both directly and indirectly with the representatives of many foreign governments on various matters covered by these speeches. As such conversations are confidential they could not according to the ordinary diplomatic usage be published without the concurrence of both governments on an agreed text.
May we take that as indicating that the discussions were in the nature of protests or representations regarding——
You may not take any such thing.
Why did the Minister refer to them, so?
What is the Minister getting so vexed about, so?
I will say this, for the record. It is not Asian 'flu that a lot of people are suffering from here but by-election fever.
The Red Hand of Ulster.
This is a very responsible citizen to have representing us at U.N.O.