Policy of Member States of the Council of Europe in the light of the present international siuation

Motion for a recommendation | Doc. 823 | 30 April 1958

Committee

Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy

Signatories:

Mr Pierre de FÉLICE, France

Thesaurus

The Assembly,

Considering that paragraph 2 of Resolution 145, adopted on 17th January 1958, asked the Western countries to be ready to enter into negotiations at the highest level provided that the summit conference was well prepared in advance;

Considering that it has also proposed that regional or limited disarmament plans should be studied by the Western Powers ;

Considering that the possibilities thus contemplated have recently become clearer, as regards both the prospects of a summit conference in the near future and the proposals for the cessation of nuclear tests and the creation of a denuclearised zone,

Recommends that the Committee of Ministers should:

1 Prepare for the success of the forthcoming summit conference by a limitation of the number of participants, with a view to ensuring that the meeting is effective ; by the inclusion on the agenda of only a few items including the reunification of Germany ; and by the prior examination of the questions to be discussed, first at the level of Ambassadors and then by the Foreign Ministers, in order that there should be real prospects of agreement on questions of substance before the conference meets ;

2 Seek an agreement on the cessation of nuclear tests within a certain period ; this agreement to be based on an effective system of supervision worked out jointly by experts of the parties to the negotiations and enforced by a special body of inspectors invested on both sides with the widest powers of control;

3 Take into consideration the proposals for a denuclearised area as a basis for discussion and improve them in order to make the military risks involved acceptable and to obtain indispensable counterparts in the political field.