—Shirley Smith Talks

The Geneva settlement provided that there should be general elections through the whole of Vietnam towards the middle of next year so that the people may determine what government they are going to have," continued Miss Smith. "It appears that these elections will be won quite decisively by the North. Let me quote to you part of an article from the Economist.—Therefore the problem of the free world is how to avoid having free elections in Vietnam, for this will mean that the state will come under the 'rebel government. The problem is increased in that if the elections are not held the Communists with claim that we are violating the Geneva Agreement.—You can bet your last piastre they will."

Fear of A-Bomb

Miss Smith also touched generally on the problems of the other lands in the sea and emphasised the "Justifiable" fears of the South-East Asian peoples. "They fear the atomic bomb, and think that it was first used upon Asia because they were only Asiatics, and it did not matter if a few of them were killed. Above all they wish for freedom and independence from colonial powers. "This was the reason for the peoples of South East Asia being wary of organisation like Seato. Of its members the United States. Great Britain. France. Australia, New Zealand, and the Phililplnes were "colonial powers or linked to colonial powers," Pakistan was "governed by a repressive dictatorship" and Thailand was "another corrupt 'musical-comedy' state."

"The peoples of South East Asia," concluded Miss Smith, "regard America's interest in their lands as an attempt to keep the area for their own capitalistic exploitation, and to this end they are using what we know as the 'Red Bogy' to excuse their exploitation."

There was no time for questions and the meeting concluded at 1 p.m.