পাতা:বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্র (চতুর্দশ খণ্ড).pdf/৯৬

64 বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্রঃ চতুর্দশ খন্ড শিরোনাম সূত্র তারিখ ২৮। পাকিস্তানের অস্ত্র মার্কিন নিউইয়র্ক টাইমস ১৮ এপ্রিল, ১৯৭১ যুক্তরাষ্ট্রে তৈরি NEW YORK TIMES, APRIL 18, 1971 PAKISTAN'S MADE-IN-IJ.S.A. ARMS By Chester Bowles Essex, Conn.-The appalling struggle now going on in East Pakistan is a further testimony to the folly of doling out arms to "friendly government's with little regard for whom they are to be used against or for what reasons. The billion-dollar military equipment program for the Government of Pakistan (meaning West Pakistan) between 1954 and 1965 enabled and encouraged the Pakistanis to attack India in 1965. Now (along with some Soviet and Chinese equipment) it is being used by the West Pakistan Government to beat down their fellow countrymen in East Pakistan who recently voted overwhelmingly for greater independence. It is particularly shoddy spectacle because there is no indication that our Government feels the slightest responsibility for how our weapons are being used. Indeed it has done its best to sweep the whole situation under the rug. Even when the International Red Cross was refused entry into East Pakistan, when all foreign correspondents had been hurriedly ushered out of the country, and when daily on-the-spot reports from our Consulate General in Dacca had described in detail the massive military action by the West Pakistan Army against East Pakistan civilians, our Government persisted in saying it did not know what was going on and therefore was in no position to comment. It was only when some 500 American refugees from East Pakistan began to give accounts to the press that our Government offered even a mild protest to the West Pakistan Government. Two actions, it seems to me, should be taken at once. First, we should lodge a strong protest with the West Pakistan Government over the misuse of U.S. military equipment and all aid except medical supplies and food should promptly be stopped. Second, we should call for a meeting of the Security Council of the United Nations to consider appropriate steps to deal with the threat to the peace of Asia which this conflict clearly has become. U.S. Government spokesmen have already ignored the first suggestion and rejected the second on the ground that the fighting in East Pakistan is an "internal question" in which we have no right to interfere. But what about U.S. action in the Congo? What about South Africa? Southern Rhodesia, Cyprus? When peace is threatened on such a massive scale the United Nations has an overriding obligation to do everything possible to settle the conflict before it gets out of control. This obligation is particularly clear when the "internal problem" is created by the efforts of a well-armed minority to subdue the overwhelming majority constituting more than one-half of a divided country, separated by more than 1,000 miles of alien territory, speaking different languages and with deep built-in cultural conflicts and differing economic interests.