Rhodesian Talks FORCE AS LAST RESORT

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30958, 14 January 1966, Page 9

Rhodesian Talks FORCE AS LAST RESORT

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright)

LAGOS, Jan. 13.

Britain has earned t ; me to prove that she can topple Mr lan Smith’s Rhodesian Government without resort to force and the Commonwealth has emerged virtually undamaged from the two-day talks on Rhodesia in Lagos.

The leaders and representatives of 20 Commonwealth nations, who ended their meeting last night, agreed to wait and see before moves were made to get United Nations action against the breakaway Salisbury authorities. Their final communique also showed that the meeting had resisted demands for immediate military intervention to bring down Mr Smith. How long the British Prime Minister, Mr Wilson, gained to show British-led economic sanctions could do the job was not indicated in the communique, but the assessment among delegates gave him at least several months. ANOTHER MEETING The conference fixed another Commonwealth leaders’ meeting for July if the Smith government is then still in power.

But Britain is confident Rhodesia will then be restored to constitutional Government and the way prepared for eventual African majority rule.

The results of the Lagos meeting are seen as personal triumphs for Mr Wilson and its chairman, the Nigerian

Prime Minister, Alhaji Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, who proposed the conference. A major achievement was that in spite of divergent moves on how to deal with Rhodesia, the fear that Commonwealth unity would be damaged remain unrealised. “GREAT SUCCESS”

Mr Wilson, who later left by air for Lusaka and talks there with Zambia’s President Kenneth Kaunda. said at the airport that the conference had been a great success and triumph. He said the Commonwealth had emerged stronger than ever before.

Sir Albert Margai, of Sierra Leone, chief advocate of using force now and Britain’s

most bitter critic at the meeting, told reporters that the outcome had been very satisfactory, though the use of force could not be excluded eventually. TURNING POINT

The turning point in the meeting came in a confrontation between Sir Albert Margai and Mr Wilson on Tuesday. Delegates said the real issues between the British Government and those advocating force were then settled in the final restricted session yesterday. The majority of African nations joined the rest of the Commonwealth in reserving force for use only as a last resort —when it was clear economic sanctions had failed.