Warm Praise

for UNO Mission In New Guinea

From a Staff Writer in New Guinei All the reports which I hi heard, all firsthand evidence have gathered in moving throi New Guinea, support the vi that the United Nations Miss: is the most thorough, expert c helpful that ever has visited t

Trust Territory.

THE Mission has shown the livel interest in all that it has s( and an impressive understanding the grave issues involved.

The outstanding figure, of cou is Sir Hugh Foot, who has dri\ force, wisdom based on experiei and a remarkable capacity for list ing while others talk.

But the American, the Indian i the Bolivian members are all strik figures, each in his own right pressing the New Guinea obsen by his sincerity, and the thorou ness with which he has examii every aspect of life here. They h been into every corner of the Te tory, and no aspect of Administrat activity and native life appears have been neglected.

I can say, after taking part many off-the-record talks, that t Mission’s findings will be very k to Australia; that Australia’s achie ments here will receive warm pra with minor criticism of some aspe of Administration; that Austn probably will be freed of any cha of deliberate or systematic exploi tion; and that the Mission has b< impressed by the remarkable frien< ness of the natives generally towa: Australia.

The visitors privately say that 1 natives should be made to real that if they ever are to have se government and independence tt must work harder and plan more tensively than they seem inclined do today.

T think that Sir Hugh Foot’s I Mission to New Guinea will go in history as a very good one inde< The American member of t Mission, Delmas H. Nucker, for ma years boss of the US Trust Terrill of the Pacific Islands (Micronesu has been doing a very good job < behalf of Australia by talking sot

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sense into natives who have asked him to have America take New Guinea over, or provide them with “cargo”. He has been aware of the cargo cult movement and is sympa thetic to Australia’s problems.

“Other members of the Mission are calling me ‘No Cargo Nucker’,” said Mr. Nucker in Goroka. “I have been explaining wherever possible to natives that their belief that America will send unlimited supplies was just a whim.”

The Cargo for Manus Mr. Nucker made one very long statement when he was asked at a meeting of Manus Island people held at Lorengau on April 19 that the US replace Australia as the Administer ing Authority.

It’s bad luck that his statement in that area may turn out to have fallen on deaf ears, for since he was there it has been announced that Manus is shortly to be turned into a big American tracking station. Millions of dollars will be spent there, and it will be just like the old wartime days when Manus was a big American base!

Here anyhow is part of what Mr.

Nucker said at Manus, for the record: “As an American, I appreciate the confidence expressed in my country.

However, you must realise that