CONTROL OF ARMS

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28259, 23 April 1957, Page 11

CONTROL OF ARMS

U.S. Leaders To Confer

(N.Z. Press Association Copyright) (Rec. 11 p.m.) AUGUSTA (Georgia), April 22. President Eisenhower will confer here tomorrow with Mr Harold Stassen, his disarmament adviser, amid fresh indications that the United States now sees some chance for agreement with the Soviet Union on a first step toward disarmament. , Mr Btassen is scheduled to arrive by plane from Washington to-night for a talk with the President tomorrow morning. After the session at the Augusta National Golf Club, Mr Stassen will start back to London for the resumption of negotiations of a United Nations Sub-committee seeking to bring the East-West atomic arms race under control. Adjournment of the negotiations for the Easter week-end brought Mr Stassen to Washington on Saturday to make an interim report to the Secretary of State, Mr Dulles, and other key Administration officials. At the conclusion of that meeting the Government issued a statement calling for a continued “serious effort to reach an initial partial agreement for a first step” towards disarmament with safeguards for inspection and control.

In announcing plans for the Eisenhower-Stassen conference tomorrow, the White House press secretary, Mr James Hagerty, said Mr Dulles had recommended that Mr Stassen make a personal report to the President.

The London talks have been going on for a month without any concrete achievement, but the Russians have been reported as showing more interest recently in reaching an agreement; Mr Stassen, on his return to Washington, termed the talks “the most serious negotiations” on the reduction and control of armaments ever held by the United Nations sub-committee.