INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS GROUP WEEKLY SUMMARY NO. 29

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Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 
CIA-RDP79-01090A000100020023-4
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RIPPUB
Original Classification: 
S
Document Page Count: 
6
Document Creation Date: 
December 12, 2016
Document Release Date: 
September 13, 2000
Sequence Number: 
23
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Publication Date: 
July 19, 1949
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PERRPT
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PDF icon CIA-RDP79-01090A000100020023-4.pdf362.34 KB
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0 F Yi'2001 /03/04 P79-010A000100020023-4 DOCUMENT CLASS qvpww~ NO.CHANGE IN DECLASSIFIED "' TS S C CHAN ZATIONS GROUP Tnt~RNATIONAI ORGA CLASS.. raFV ATE: EVIEWER: DDS . s'E1 LY SUV! MARY NO. 29 For week ending 19 July 1949 volume II The International Week Economic problems deriving ntc frbm the & er~had.o~rrthedinternational and the US recession continued picture. Syria and Israel finally agreed on an armistice as the Palestine Conciliation Commission reconvened at Lausanne. Although heading for an ultimate SC veto, the French arms, census proposal received 8-3 (USSR, Ukraine, Egypt) approval from a subcommittee of the UN Commission on Conventional Armaments. Substantial progress was made by the CFM deputies now drafting an Austrian Treaty. Meanwhile, on the' international labor front, the USSR appealed directly to the rank and file of Western work- era to affiliate with the new industrial departments of the WFTU. 25X6A Approved For Release 2001/03/04: CT9-01090A000100020023-4 Approved For"Iease 2001/ A-RDP79-1090A000100020023-4 25X6A USSR o ens drive to bring feftwin Western labor into WFT(J. aren a or to encourage the en ranee o e tw ng '"es - a I pp n an ern workers into the industry-wide ',"MW "trade departments" now the USSR has broadcast an appeal to "workers ized , being organ whose organizations have left the Federation," urging them to form " zommittees of cooperation and liaison with the 1F TJ." The USSR suggests that they press their national labor organizations to permit, affiliation of component industrial unions with the world federation and reiterates that the sJIFTU is still ready to "coop- erate" with the veteran craft internationals. Simultaneously, the Soviet press emphasizes that two seats on the new WNIFTU Execu- tive Committee have been left vacant for the US and the UK. These moves indicate that the Sovietized :IFTU leadership intends to accelerate its drive to assimilate leftwing unions in the ;'lest but that it will attempt, wherever possible, to accomplish this without forcing the leftwing unions to leave their national organizations. rrrgnT to demand UN inauirs into colonial labor conditions. - ..111 ,L Gr7 ~JV 314dV vv vv -_ .~_._r ----v s - that the UN Economic and Social Council undertake an extensive in- quiry into labor conditions in colonial areas. At the WFTU Milan Congress, the Soviet delegate urged that the Council hear com- plaints from colonial trade unions and send out commissions to "study" conditions in India, Iran, South Africa, Brazil, Chile and Venezuela. This proposal suggests that the USSR would like another foram in which to air its attacks upon "imperialist repression" in dependent areas and that, by so doing, it hopes to offset the effect of approaching UN inquiries into forced labor and human rights violations inside the Soviet orbit. The selection of six countries where labor organization has proceeded only under close governmental tutelage is apparently calculated to embarrass 'Western UN delegations defending the concept of "free trade unionism". Approved For Release 2001/ RDP79-01090A000100020023-4 Approved For l (ease 2001 9IA-RDP79-C 090A000100020023-4 Point Four counter-attack. The USSR is evidently prepar- ing a wo-prongs a as on t e US Point Four program of techni- cal assistance to underdeveloped countries. First, Soviet pro- paganda media are plugging the line that Point Four is intended to wrest control of colonial possessions from the "Marshall" countries and to extract super-profits for US monopolists. The second aspect of the Soviet attack is as yet less clearly devel- oped, but there are already indications of competing Soviet or Satellite technical assistance offers to Asiatic countries. Czechoslovakia has reportedly made commitments to give aid to certain industries in Pakistan and to have offered similar aid to Ceylon. Furthermore, Embassy Karachi estimates that a Soviet trade mission may also offer Pakistan technical assistance. These Soviet moves, however meager their substantive results may be, indicate that the USSR recognizes the great long-range po- tentialities of Point Four in combatting the spread of Communism in the underdeveloped areas of the world. w - Agzr Approved For Release 2001/03/04: CIA-RDP79-0109OA000100020023-4 Approved For cease 2001/03/04: CIA-RDP79`090A000100020023-4 4OWT far/ iO cT Austrians to withdraw front ~i?TU The Socialist-led Aus- trian r ?Un oni Fe eratxoxieportJiy plans to quit the ''tFTU before November,, The Austrian Federation*s president stated that he would have preferred to withdraw at the and of the occup a- tion but that international labor developments forced Austria to take a stand meanwhile. This pledge leaves the Finnish and Israeli organizations as the only important non-Communist national labor groups still inside the WFTt5 Addin = insult..... In its latest slap at the UN, the Un$.on. ''vf` Sou ~" rxcm has nQtfied the UN Seex?etar.4-General that it will submit 'no further reports on South West Africa. This development, a logical step in the Union's policy of absorbing its former Learrue. of Nation6 mandate, will serve only to intensity the bitter attacks on South Africa which will occur during the current session of the UN Trusteeship Council,, Soviet protagonists could hardly ask for a juicier morsel of anti-colonial propaganda. UN?SCCB to invite Soviet and Polish artic ation., The UN Bal.kanC,otrar? _ttee plans tc re x i4ite Lie 1 and Po1a,nd to fill their Committee seas, This an a"-though motivated i.-y recent indications of Soviet interest .n the Greek problem,, is unlikelyC?B tQ meet with success since the S^R has repeatedly dent as i ea`:snc would t if it des red to participate in a Greek set,tlemant probe 1y pre?. rto b, _pass the Committee completely, Approved For Release 2001/0 IA-RDP79-0109OA000100020023-4 4 Approved For RAtease 2001 /0 '-RDP79-0 9OA000100020023-4 LIKELY EFFECTS OF THE DOLLAR SHORTAGE The continuing European dollar shortage, likely to be further accentuated should the US recession lead to additional cuts both in the ERP and European dollar export possibilities, may well force significant changes in European recovery programs. The ERP countries are now well aware that their dollar export targets for 1952 and thus their prospects for eliminating their extraordinary dollar deficit are grossly over-optimistic. Con- sequently, they are being forced to shift still further toward even greater reductions of dollar imports, while seeking to fill ever more of their needs from non-dollar sources despite higher costs, In short 9 they must seek to balance their dollar trade at lower levels then hitherto aimed at. An example of this trend is the revised Swedish long term program, which, recognizing the declining dollar market for Sweden's key pulp exports, calls for a shift to greater trade with the ERP countries at the expense of dollar imports and exports. Acceleration of such policies will encourage still greater 'Jestern European efforts to expand East-West trade and, since the Soviet bloc will-want many items on the 1-A and 1-B lists, this will increase the pressure against Western export controls. An- other significant effect may be to strengthen the existing tend- ency toward making the ERP area, as well as the sterling bloc, more of a closed discriminatory trading area, probably under UK leadership, within which trade could be expanded while being in- sulated from low-cost dollar competition. Although such a trend toward self-sufficiency might contribute toward the ERP objective of reducing the abnormal European dollar deficits it would run counter to the US policy of seeking freer world trade and to the undertakings which the ?arshall Plan countries have made to this end. It would tend to perpetuate uneconomic high cost production to the extent that it removed the threat of US competition. How- evero the British, for example, point out that freer multilateral trade and convertible currencies, while desirable for anormal economic situation and for countries which, like the US, have adequate foreign exchange reserves and are efficient low cost pro- dueerss is hardly possible at present for nations which must cone- serve inadequate dollar rriouroes and prepare against the day when US underwriting of their deficits will and. In the financial field, there is likely to be further strong pressure for devaluation of several European currencies, a measure probably inevitable in the long run in order to restore eompeti- tivu European export pricer. Since any general devaluation hinges upon British willingness to devalue sterling, the UK will be in- creasingly prodded by the continent and by its customers. France and some other countries are probably only waiting for the UK to act. To cushion any such devaluation, the Marshall Plan countries Approved For Release 2001/ ,.,-,IA-RDP79-01090A000100020023-4 Approved For `NC6Iease 2001 /CIA-RDP79-`1090A000100020023-4 may well revive their 1947 Proposal that the US create a huge stabilization what the International Monetary Fund ~res resources are a grand scale totally inadequate to do. Approved For Release 2001/0 #RDP79-01090A000100020023-4