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Tuesday, October 03, 2006

October 3, 1960: Hammarskjold Refuses Call to Resign, Jordan: US is 'Only Hope', Nixon Accused of Smear, JFK Called 'Playboy', UN Could Consider China

Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev today called on United Nations Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold to resign. "To avoid misinterpretation I want to reaffirm that we do not trust Mr. Hammarskjold and cannot trust him. If he himself does not muster up enough courage to resign, as to say, in a chivalrous manner, then we shall draw the necessary conclusions from the continuing situation." Khrushchev wants the secretary general to be replaced with a three-member body representing the three major blocs of UN members. Khrushchev has said that the secretary general is biased in favor of the "imperialist" powers. Hammarskjold refused to step down.

Jordan's King Hussein, 24, said at the UN today that Khrushchev wanted to "destroy the United Nations, to hamper its deliberations, to block its decisions and by rowdy tactics and petulant walkouts, to demean the reputation of the Security Council and the General Assembly." The king said the U.S. was "the only hope of peace and freedom."

The prime minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, said at the United Nations today that the world body was "weighted in favor of Europe and the Americas." But he declined to press for an immediate change to the UN charter.

Sen. Henry Jackson (D-Wash.), the Democratic National Chairman, accused Vice President Richard Nixon of questioning Sen. John Kennedy's patriotism, "Somehow or other, Mr. Nixon never finds a Democrat patriotic. He always raised some questions. He did it with Stevenson. He did it with Truman and now he's doing it with Kennedy." Jackson said Nixon's "mask of respectability is beginning to slip."

Sen. Lyndon Johnson also criticized Nixon, in part on Vietnam. The Democratic candidate for vice president said Nixon had misjudged "the situation in Indochina in 1954, when he made a hot-headed proposal that American soldiers should be sent there to fight in the jungles."

Nixon, meanwhile, was campaigning "in the Old Confederacy," as the New York Times would report for tomorrow's edition. In Richmond, Virginia, and Charlotte, North Carolina, the vice president tried to "impress those Southern Democrats who look on Senator Kennedy as a dangerous radical -- states' rights, local control of the education system and economy in government," the paper would report.

A Republican "truth squad" member said today that Kennedy was absent for more than one quarter of recorded votes in the Senate. The presidency "is no job for a playboy," Sen. Hugh Scott (R-Penna.) said.

The General Assembly met late tonight to discuss whether the body should consider Communist China's admission to the UN. The issue has come up for nine years running, but has never made it on the agenda; it is expected that once again this year the question will not be opened for full discussion.

The delegate from Burma, U Thant, said the UN "is not a Sunday school for good nations only.... We outlaw a country and then complain that it is not following United Nations resolutions," he said. India also supported putting the China question on the agenda. The British delegate said his country recognizes Peiping but opposed putting inclusion up for discussion because it t"would not contribute to a solution ... [with views still] so strongly held."

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference staged "stand-ins" in 13 cities to protest barriers to voter registration for Negroes.

Chevrolet announced that it will expand its Corvair line of small, rear-engine cars. New for 1961 will be a station wagon and a van, or "sports wagon."