As this is being written, representatives of the thirty-three nations that are signatories to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) have just met again in Geneva. Their deliberations, though usually given minor notice in the press, are important. About four-fifths of the world's international trade is carried on by the countries participating in GATT.

Collective security is a term that has been applied to a variety of different arrangements. Originally and traditionally, it denoted the League of Nations type of security system. Lately, it has been used to describe the North Atlantic Treaty Organization with its inter-governmental machinery, as well as other regional or non-regional defense pacts

The dispute between Britain and Iran relating to the nationalization and seizure of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company concessions and refinery plants by the government of Premier Mossadegh aroused unusual interest when brought before the International Court of Justice by Britain in 1951. The Iranian Oil Nationalization Act, coming after long and bitter negotiations between the oil company and the Iranian Government over oil royalties and operational arrangements, carried with it important political and strategic considerations.

For the convenience of readers, we are listing here membership of United Nations organs for 1954. Dates in parantheses represent ends of terms; the states serve through December 31 of the year listed.

The first part of the eighth regular session of the General Assembly met in the General Assembly building at United Nations headquarters from September 15 to December 9, 1953, and considered an agenda of 76 items. After adopting by 44 votes to 10 with 2 abstentions a United States draft resolution to postpone for the duration of the eighth session in the current year consideration of all proposals to exclude representatives of the government of the Republic of China and to seat representatives of the Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China, the Assembly elected Mrs. Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit (India) president of the eighth session over Prince Wan Waithayakon (Thailand) by a vote of 37 to 22. Dr. Miguel R. Urquia was elected chairman of the Ad Hoc Political Committee; the following were elected chairmen of the main committees: Political and Security Committee, Fernand van Langenhove (Belgium); Economic and Financial Committee, Leo Mates (Yugoslavia); Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee, G. F. Davidson (Canada); Trusteeship Committee, Dr. Santiago Pérez Pérez (Venezuela); Administrative and Budgetary Committee, Awni Khalidy (Iraq); and Legal Committee, Juliusz Katz-Suchy (Poland).

This issue covers the work of the Security Council from the 618th meeting on August 12, 1953, to the 645th meeting on December 3, 1953.

Minquiers and Ecrehos Case: In a judgment of November 17,1953, the International Court of Justice unanimously found that jurisdiction over the island groups of Minquiers and Ecrehos was vested in the United Kingdom. The Court interpreted the special agreement concluded between the United Kingdom and France on September 24, 1951, by which the Court was seized of the dispute, as eliminating the possibility of finding the territories to be res nullius or having a status of condominium. The Court further interpreted the phrase “in so far as they are capable of appropriation” as meaning that the Court was asked to determine which party had sovereignty over each island group and not the sovereignty of individual units of which each group consisted.

In a general introduction to a survey of agricultural development in Latin America published recently by the Food and Agriculture Organization, the Director-General (Dodd) stressed the importance of the problem for the future development of the region. He pointed out that if the current rate of population increase continued, the population of the region would increase by 25 percent in the next ten years; in order to maintain even present standards of food consumption, therefore, agricultural output would have to be increased. Infact, he continued, per capita consumption had been rising, largely through decreased exports of food and increased imports of food; the implications of this policy were, however, undesirable in terms of the region's long-range development. Mr. Dodd emphasized that Latin America depended almost solely on the export of raw materials, largely agricultural products, for earning foreign exchange; a reduction in its earnings of foreign exchange resulting from fewer exports, coupled with the expenditure of a larger proportion of available foreign exchange for food imports, he pointed out, would delay general economic development which required large imports of industrial material. In order, therefore, to maintain the rate of economic development and at the same time to improve levels of food consumption, it was extremely important to increase greatly food and agricultural production.

The eighth annual meeting of the Board of Governors of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development was held in Washington from September 9 to 12, 1953, under the chairmanship of Mohamad Ali, Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs of Pakistan. Two of the six plenary meetings were joint sessions with the Board of Governors of the International Monetary Fund. On September 11 an informal panel discussion was held on the subject of private international investment in under-developed countries.

The first full-length session of the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization since the seventh session of the Assembly opened in Montreal on October 7, 1953. Members and chairmen of the Council's subsidiary organs were appointed by the Council upon the nomination of ICAO members: Walter Binaghi (Argentina) was reappointed chairman of the Air Navigation Commission; Enrique Loaeza (Mexico) was appointed chairman of the Air Transport Committee; and Joaquim de Brito Subtil (Portugal) chairman of the Committee on Joint Support of Air Navigation Services.

The 123d session of the Governing Body of the International Labor Organization met in Geneva, November 24 to 27, 1953. On the basis of the report of the United Nations-ILO Ad Hoc Committee on Forced Labor, the Governing Body decided to take the following steps: 1) to appeal to governments which had not yet done so to ratify the four ILO conventions which dealt with forced labor or indigenous workers; 2) to invite metropolitan governments to consider applying the four conventions without modification to all their non-metropolitan territories; 3) to consider the desirability of revising the forced labor convention adopted by ILO in 1930 to make it provide for the complete suppression of forced or compulsory labor in all its forms; and 4) to affirm ILO's willingness to intensify its efforts toward the abolition of forced labor practices of an economic character, including practices not envisaged when the conventions were adopted.

The eighth annual meeting of the Board of Governors of the International Monetary Fund was held in Washington jointly with the Board of Governors of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development from September 9 through 12, 1953, under the chairmanship of Mohamad Ali, Governor for Pakistan.

The Executive Board of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization held its 36th session in Paris, November 30 through December 9, 1953, under the chairmanship of General Sir Ronald Adam. The Board requested the Director-General to submit detailed proposals for the organization of the eighth session of the General Conferenceto the Board's 37th session. In preparing these, he was to take into account the views expressed by the Board, particularly those concerng arrangements for discussion of the Director-General's report, discussion of the draft program and budget estimates, general organization of meetings, voting procedure, and documents and records. organization of meetings, voting procedure, and documents and records. The Board recommended that the eighth session of the General Conference revise its rules of procedure to provide that, in case of doubt as to whether a proposed amendment was an amendment of substance or an amendment of form, it be deemed an amendment of substance unless a two-thirds majority favored interpreting it otherwise. The Board also requested member states to submit their reports for the eighth session of the Conference to the Director-General not later than April 15, 1954.

During September 1953 sessions of four regional committees of the World Health Organization were held. From September 7 to 10, the third session of the WHO Regional Committee for Europe met in Copenhagen. Among the major recommendations of the committee, which was attended by delegates from 22 countries, was that Geneva should become the permanent site of the regional office for Europe. For 1955 aid to health projects, training courses, and other activities in European countries, the committee recommended a budget of approximately $l,600,000. Part of this amount was to come from the regular budget of WHO, and the rest from United Nations technical assistance funds, UNICEF, and other agencies having joint program arrangements with WHO. The work already carried out through the regional office for Europe received general approval, minor revisions in the plans for 1954 were made, and a program for 1955 was discussed and approved. Particular attention in the plans for Europe was given to educational and training activities; these included conferences on various subjects, such as modern trends in tuberculosis control, and special studies of interest to many countries on such subjects as water standards, teaching methods for nurses, and sanitary engineering terminology in English and French. An extensive fellowship program was also approved. Despite the emphasis on education and training in the program for 1955, almost a fifth of the total budget for this year was to be devoted to the control of certain communicable diseases, such as tuberculosis (in Austria, Finland and Turkey), diphtheria and whooping cough (in Yugoslavia), and trachoma (in Tunisia and Morocco).

The Executive Committee of the World Meteorological Organization held its fourth session in Geneva from October 6 through 26, 1953. Formal approval was given to all the new meteorological codes and forms of message recommended by the Commission for Synoptic Meteorology. The Secretary-General (Swaboda) was asked to prepare a report on the different units of measurement used in weather reports (Celsius v. Fahrenheit, knots v metres per second, millimeters v. inches, etc.) in order that the WMO Congress, to which the Executive Committee referred the question, could determine the desirability of a universal agreement on units for weather reports. Various recommendations of the Commission for Climatology and the Commission for Aerology concerning the need for publishing surface and upper air observations were considered. The International Barometer Convention proposed by the Commission for Instruments and Methods of Observation was approved, and members were asked to apply the Convention from January 1, 1955. The Executive Committee also considered problems relating to the publication of the new international cloud atlas, especially the text of the abridged atlas and the revision of the English text of the main volume. General satisfaction with the development of the WMO program in the field of technical assistance was expressed by the Executive Committee, which also approved the working arrangement with the Technical Assistance Administration. The Secretary-General was authorized to continue negotiations with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization on a working agreement; a working agreement between WMO and the International Civil Aviation Organization was approved to become effective January 1, 1954. It was decided to create a consultative status for interested non-governmental organizations which would entitle them to send observers to the WMO Congress and regional and technical bodies and to present working documents. After deciding to hold the second WMO Congress in April 1955, the Executive Committee adopted a provisional budget for 1954 of $363,000, of which $27,250 was alloted for publications and $64,500 for the production of the international cloud atlas. The fifth session of the committee was scheduled for late August or early September 1954.

The principal item of discussion at the third part of the fifth ordinary session of the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe, which was held in Strasbourg from September 15 through 26, 1953, was “defining the policy of the Council of Europe in the light of recent developments in the international situation”, which had been scheduled for debate in June but postponed until after the Bermuda Conference between the United Kingdom, the United States and France.

The eleventh session of the South Pacific Commission was held from April 28 to 30, 1953, immediately following the Second South Pacific Conference, at Commission headquarters in Anse-Vata, Noumea, under the chairmanship of Sir Henry M. Scott, Q.C., alternate Senior Commissioner for the United Kingdom. All agenda items were considered in Committee of the Whole, which was the only committee established at this session. Two plenary meetings were held; at the second the reports of the committee, which included recommendations and draft resolutions, were considered.