asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he will give details of the resolutions moved, supported or opposed by the Irish representatives at the United Nations in the past year.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - United Nations Resolutions.
17.
The General Assembly of the United Nations at its last session adopted 180 resolutions. Ireland voted in favour of 152 of them and abstained on the remaining 28. Ireland was among the cosponsors of nine of the resolutions, dealing with —International Conference of Experts for the Support of Victims of Colonialism and Apartheid in Southern Africa; — Implementation of the results of the Conference of Non-Nuclear-Weapon States; — Report of the Secretary-General on napalm and other incendiary weapons; — Urgent need for suspension of nuclear and thermonuclear tests; — Maltreatment and torture of prisoners and detainees, opponents of Apartheid in South Africa; — humanitarian assistance to persons in the Middle East displaced as a result of the June, 1967, hostilities; — establishment of a time-table for full self-government by Papua New Guinea; — the United Nations Educational and Training Programme for Southern Africa; —Respect for human rights in armed conflicts.
I regret that it would not be feasible for me to attempt to furnish a summary of all the resolutions adopted by the General Assembly last year, but, if the Deputy cares to contact me, I shall be happy to show him the texts.
Could I ask the Minister if the present Cabinet adhere to the policy held by the majority of the member States of the United Nations in respect of population control?
The Minister has given a list of the type of questions we supported. On what type of question have we abstained?
I could not answer that just now because it would be a very long reply and I would have to extract them all.
Could the Minister give us an idea as to some of them?
I can only say that glancing through the list and picking out some, some have been resolutions related, for example, to South Africa but couched in terms that we might find it difficult to support in some respects. If the Deputy is concerned about that, he might like to put down a question more specifically on the point. There is a complete set of resolutions which I will place in the Library that have not yet been printed but are available in stencilled form. The Deputy could browse, as I have been doing, through them with interest and advantage.
Could I have an answer to my question?
I am not in a position to answer that question because I am not clear from the terms of it whether it relates to one of the other 143 resolutions which we supported. Is the Deputy referring to a particular resolution in this book?
I think the Minister knows perfectly well what I am referring to.
If the Deputy puts down a separate question, he will get an answer.