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...
back before 1945). In particular, Article 73 of the Charter
stipulates that these administering States recognize the principle
that "the interests of the inhabitants of these (non-self governing)
territories are paramount" and accept inter alia to "promote to the
utmost...the well-being of the inhabitants"
to ensure their
"political, economic, social and educational advancement... "and to develop self-government" (underlining added). The UK is also
obliged, under Article 73(e) of the Charter to "transmit regularly
to the Secretary-General. statistical and other information of a
technical nature relating to economic, social and educational
conditions" in the territories for which it is responsible. This
information is examined by the Special Committee on the Situation
with Regard to the Implementation of the Declaration on the Granting
of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples (Committee of 24)
which was established after the adoption of General Assembly
Resolution 1514 (XV) in 1960 on this question.
Policy
4.
Successive UK governments have subscribed to the principles set
out in the Charter which have been reflected in the long established UK policy of giving every help to those dependent territories which
wished to proceed to independence, while not forcing it on those
which did not. Ministers have, since the mid 1960's, stressed in
public the principle that the wishes of the people concerned must be
the main guide to action. The transition from the Article 73
language of "interests" to "wishes" can be illustrated by the
example of Gibraltar at the UN in the early 1960's: the debate on
the question of Gibraltar in 1963 was not conducted in terms of the
language of Article 73. What was considered important was the
principle of equal rights and self-determination (stemming from
Article I of the Charter) which could be considered to imply that
the wishes of the peoples of non-self governing territories are
paramount but, at the least, implies they should be take into
account. Thus from the beginning of the debate, the UK felt committed to take the wishes of the people of Gibraltar into
However, once the UN accepted the Spanish thesis that
account.
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