Singapore (2.0 million) or of (b) North Vietnam (21.3 million), South Vietnam (19.9 million), North Korea (13.3 million), Laos (2.9 million) and Cambodia (6.7 million) or of (c) Iran (27.9 million), Iraq (8.8 million), Israel (2.8 million), Jordan (2.7 million) Syria (8.9 million), Algeria (13.4 million), Lybia (1.9 million and Lebanon (2.6 million) or (d) the combined population of Austria (7.4 million), Hungary (10.3 million), Finland (4.7 million), Belgium (8.7 million), Netherlands (12.9 million), Denmark (4.9 million), Sweden (7.9 million), Switzerland (6.2 million) and Luxembourg (0.4 million), Bangladesh will be the eighth largest State in the world and the second largest among the muslim countries. The aspirations of the people of this big country to have autonomy or independence cannot be neglected. A peaceful and permanent solution to the present boiling problem can be achieved only through negotiations with the provisional government of Bangladesh. If this fact is not recognized, the fight for freedom will continue indefinitely, thus aggravating and prolonging the sufferings of the people. The people in East Pakistan are already in terrible condition. Besides mass murders, the economic life of the country has been shattered through arson, shelling and large scale bombing. East Pakistan is deficit in food and depends heavily on imports. Last cyclone which affected only a few million people in a limited area necessitated massive foreign aid. Five million refugees in India have become a difficult international problem. What about the seventy million people inside East Pakistan? The military government has kept all information about Bangladesh secret and suppressed. It can however be imagined that vast majority of the people must be facing starvation, disease and death. While international help in massive scale is required to save them, such help must be administered through U. N. agencies so as to ensure that such help reaches the needy people and is not misused by troops. It may be added that much of the relief supplies meant for cyclone victims has either been misused or has not yet been distributed.
As an independent state Bangladesh can be a self-sufficient agricultural country. It can live in peace, co-operation, and good relations with the neighboring countries. Because of its strategic position, it can contribute a lot in the maintenance of peace in South East Asia. Bengalis are good muslims but not communal minded. They can live in harmony with the people of other communities. The Bangladesh Government has declared that it will have friendly relations with all the countries of the world. If Bangladesh is not recognized the people's fighting for the right of self-determination will adopt extreme measures and may ultimately go over to the communist camp. This will be a severe blow to the free world, particularly to the muslim countries.
XIV. The attitude of Yahya Khan's Government to East Pakistan tragedy.
The regime which is solely responsible for the unprecedented tragedy in East Pakistan cannot have any sympathy or worry for the people of Bangladesh. The Yahya- Tikka Khan administration wanted to cow-down the Bengalis and crush their autonomy movement by killing a large number of people within 72 hours before the outside world could have any ideas of their brutality. They have got control of cities and towns and are holding them at the point of guns, but the rural areas particularly the border areas are far
