Secret
Telegram
November 30, 1971
From:
US Mission UN NY
To:
Secretary State Washington DC
Subject:
India/Pakistan Yahya Letter to SYG
1.
By covering note (para 2 below) President of SC has circulated: Letter of
President Yahya to SYG (Para 3) requesting him "to consider"
stationing of UN observer group in Pakistan on East Pak border: and SYG letter
(para 4) to President of SC. Pak Minister Masud told US A.M. of November 30 that at
moment Paks here have no further steps in mind and are awaiting instructions.
2.
SC President Note:
"At the request of the President of the
Security Council the attached letter from the Secretary General dated 29
November 1971, together with a message from the President of Pakistan Yahya
Khan of 20 November 1971, are circulating to all the
members of the Security Council for their
information".
3.
President Yahya letter to SYG "(November
29, 1971)
"Excellency, as you will have seen from my
letter of November 23, a grave situation prevails at present on the borders of East Pakistan as a result of unprovoked
and large-scale attacks by the Indian armed forces. As your excellency, is
aware, while accepting your offer of good offices I have proposed a simultaneous
withdrawal of Indian and Pakistani forces and suggested that this may be
supervised by UN observers. India unfortunately did not
accept the proposal. In order to obviate a threat to peace and to arrest the
deteriorating situation, I now request your excellency to consider stationing a
force of UN observers on our side of the East Pakistan border immediately, to
observe and report upon violations of our territory".
*Signed General Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan, President
of Pakistan.
4.
SYG letter to SC President (November 29, 1971)
"Excellency, as I have been keeping the
President of the Security Council continuously informed of my exchanges of communications
with the governments of India and Pakistan concerning the situation
in the sub-continent, I am sending your excellency a copy of a message which I
have today received from President Yahya Khan of Pakistan. You will observe that this
message contains a request to me to consider stationing a force of UN observers
on the Pakistan side of the East Pakistan border immediately.
In my memorandum of 20
July 1971, to the President of the Security Council I wrote that the political
aspects of this matter are of such far-reaching importance that the secretary
general is not in a position to suggest precise courses of action before the
members of the Security Council have taken note of the problem. In the context
of the present military conflict, the stationing of observers by the UN on the
territory of a sovereign state, even at the request of that state, is obviously
an action for which the authority of the Security Council should be obtained. I
believe therefore that the members of the Security Council should be informed,
in whatever manner your excellency as President might deem desirable, of the
request of President Yahya Khan for stationing UN observers.
I also feel that, in the light of its primary
responsibility under the charter of the maintenance of international peace and
security, the Security Council should give serious consideration to the
situation prevailing in the sub-continent. In this connection I would wish to
add that I have been obliged to conclude that in this matter I have gone, for
the moment, as far as the secretary general may usefully and meaningfully go in
the present circumstances.
Accept Excellency, the assurances of my highest
consideration.
Signed U Thant".
His Excellency Mr. Eugeniusz Kulaga, President of
the Security Council, UN, New York.
Bush
Source: Bangladesh Liberation War and the Nixon House 1971, Enayetur
Rahim and Joyce L. Rahim, Pustaka Dhaka, p – 406 - 408