Office of the Historian

614. Telegram From the Department of State to the Mission to the United Nations1

Washington, December 7, 1965, 7:28 p.m.

1431. SPC-Apartheid. USUN’s 24862 and 2531.3 Dept concurs your recommendation abstention on general apartheid resolution as whole provided separate negative votes can be registered on operative paragraphs 1 and 7 and with strong statement explaining our position situation in South Africa not now threat to peace within meaning Chapter VII and therefore sanctions inapplicable. We also agree your recommendations on paragraph votes.4

Rusk
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, SOC 14 S AFR/UN. Confidential. Drafted by Officer in Charge of U.N. Political Affairs Patricia M. Byrne of IO/UNP; cleared by Director of the Office of United Nations Political Affairs Elizabeth Ann Brown, Williams, EUR Regional Planning and United Nations Adviser Edward T. Lampson, and Legal Adviser Leonard C. Meeker; and approved by Deputy Assistant Secretary of International Organization Affairs David H. Popper. Repeated to London and Pretoria.1↩
  2. Telegram 2486 from USUN, December 3, transmitted the text of the draft resolution on apartheid supported by 45 Afro-Asian nations. (Ibid.)↩
  3. Telegram 2531 from USUN, December 6, reported that the U.S. Delegation recommended that the United States abstain on the resolution as a whole, provided that it had the opportunity to vote “no” on operative paragraphs 1 and 7, which called for economic and diplomatic sanctions against South Africa. (Ibid.)↩
  4. On December 15, the U.N. General Assembly adopted Resolution 2054 A (XX) by a vote of 80 to 2 with 16 abstentions (including the United States). For text, see American Foreign Policy: Current Documents, 1965, pp. 665–666.↩