made available to the Council on its call. Two semipermanent bodies, the Commission for Conventional Armaments (CCA) and the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC)-the latter an organ established by the General Assembly which reports to the Security Council on security matters-assist it in specific areas of the security field. As regards peaceful settlement, the work of the Council has required increasingly the use of subsidiary organs, especially commissions to investigate or mediate on the spot. Most of the Council's work in the Indonesian case during 1948 was done through the Good Offices Committee created in 1947. In 1948 the Council created two similar bodies: the Palestine Truce Commission, composed of representatives of Belgium, France, and the United States; and the five-member United Nations Commission for India and Pakistan, composed of the United States, Argentina, Czechoslovakia, Belgium, and Colombia. Voting Procedure Throughout 1948 the questions of the proper scope and use of the permanent members' rights of veto were problems of the Council as an operating body. The voting procedures remained unchanged, and the veto was used in five questions-in all instances by the Soviet Union. These vetoes prevented the Council from adopting the decision favored by the large majority of its members in the Czechoslovak and the Berlin cases; on the reports of the AEC;,and in the applications of Italy and Ceylon for membership in the United Nations. The efforts of the great majority of Members of the United Nations, including the United States, to secure the adoption of voting procedures which would put limits on the exercise of the veto so as to carry out the intent of the Charter and to increase the effectiveness of the Security Council were developed further in 1948. Although the Interim Committee of the General Assembly made a useful study of the problem and its Ad Hoc Political Committee adopted its conclusions in large part, the U.S.S.R. stubbornly opposed any liberalization of the voting procedure. In 1947 the practice developed under which the abstention of a permanent member is not considered to be a veto. This practice has become, through further usage, an established part of the custom of the Council. Thus many nonprocedural resolutions for which only some of the permanent members of the Council were willing to cast affirma tive votes were nevertheless adopted. To this extent the Council's effectiveness has been increased. Whatever may be the ultimate outcome of the serious problems with which the Council grappled during 1948, one fact stands out. This fact is the extensive use which states made of the Council in order to attempt solutions of their serious disputes. Despite the difficulties occasioned by the abuse of the veto and by basic disagreements among the permanent members, the Security Council continued its role as the organ primarily responsible for the maintenance of international peace and security. ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COUNCIL The existence of the Economic and Social Council reflects the vital concern of the Members of the United Nations with the world's economic and social problems and symbolizes their aspirations for economic and social progress. The Charter assigns to the Council—an 18-nation body of which the United States is a member by election of the General Assembly-wide responsibilities with respect to economic, social, cultural, educational, health, human rights, and related matters. The Charter recognizes that progress in these fields is necessary to peaceful and friendly relations among states. The Economic and Social Council naturally does not and cannot itself carry out the vast range of activities which go to make up the network of economic and social cooperation under the United Nations. The complexity of international economic and social problems in our present-day civilization is such that a number of specialized organizational tools have had to be devised for particular purposes. There are, first, the "specialized agencies" of the United Nations, which are the major operating arms of the United Nations. Each agency has its own sphere of responsibility and set of functions, which are defined for it by a separate constitution legally independent of the United Nations Charter. There are at present 11 specialized agencies: the Universal Postal Union (UPU), the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the International Labor Organization (ILO), the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Monetary Fund (FUND), the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (BANK), the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the World Meteorological Organization (WMO),2 and the International Refugee Organization (IRO). The basic instruments of two more agencies are now awaiting action by governments-the International Trade Organization (ITO) and the Intergovernmental Maritime Consultative Organization (IMCO). These new agencies are essential to round out the economic and social structure of the United Nations. In general this report does not cover the accomplishments during the year of each of the specialized agencies except so far as they were the subject of discussion or action by the Economic and Social Council or the General Assembly. Part of the United Nations proper, yet similar to the specialized agencies by virtue of its specialized operations, is the United Nations. International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF). The Fund, which is subject to the general authority of the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly, functions semiautonomously under a 26-nation Executive Board elected by the General Assembly and through a staff responsible administratively to the Secretary-General of the United Nations. The second set of specialized organizational tools consists of the nine functional commissions of the Economic and Social CouncilHuman Rights, Economic and Employment, Transport and Communications, Statistical, Fiscal, Population, Social, Status of Women, Narcotic Drugs-and three regional economic commissions for Europe (ECE), Latin America (ECLA), and Asia and the Far East (ECAFE). Each of these commissions, except the Fiscal Commission, held one or more meetings during 1948. Under the Charter of the United Nations the Economic and Social Council is given the responsibility of coordinating the work of the specialized agencies through procedures of consultation and advice. For this purpose the Council has negotiated relationship agreements between the United Nations and the specialized agencies. The technical commissions, which are directly responsible to the Council, assist the Council in its work. 2 At present this organization is an informal body known as the International Meteorological Organization. It will become a formal intergovernmental agency after the necessary number of countries have ratified its new convention, which was drawn up in 1947. The Council held two sessions in 1948, the Sixth Session, at United Nations headquarters, Lake Success, N. Y., from February 2 to March 11, and the Seventh Session, at the European office of the United Nations, Geneva, Switzerland, from July 19 to August 29. Charles Malik, of Lebanon, served as President of the Council for the year. The substantive results of the Council's deliberations, conducted in more than 100 plenary meetings, are considered in part B of this report. In the organizational field the Council established an additional commission-the Economic Commission for Latin America, with terms of reference similar to those of the other regional commissions concluded an agreement of relationship with the International Refugee Organization, and approved a draft agreement with the proposed Intergovernmental Maritime Consultative Organization. The only relationship agreements which remain to be negotiated are those with the World Meteorological Organization and the projected International Trade Organization. At its Third Session in Paris the General Assembly asked the Economic and Social Council to expedite its consideration of the establishment of an Economic Commission for the Middle East. This will be taken up by the Council at its Eighth Session in February 1949. The proper scope of the Council's jurisdiction was brought into question by the action of Yugoslavia in bringing before the Economic and Social Council a claim for the return to it of certain gold reserves held by the United States. These reserves had been retained by the United States pending the settlement of outstanding claims and counterclaims between the two Governments. The Council decided that the matter did not fall within its competence because of the legal issues involved and expressed the hope that the two Governments would settle the dispute as soon as possible. The dispute was later resolved in the claims settlement between the United States and Yugoslavia signed on July 19, 1948. During the review of the work of the Economic and Social Council by the General Assembly at its Third Session in Paris, a number of speakers dealt with the accomplishments of the Council, its functional and regional economic commissions, and the specialized agencies concerned with economic and financial matters. Some, including the United States Representative, expressed general satisfaction with the work accomplished and in progress; with the nearly completed emergence from the organizational stage to the stage of operations; and with the steps taken to improve coordination of the activities and programs of the specialized agencies and organs of the United Nations. Many speakers stressed the economic and financial problems of underdeveloped countries in general or with specific reference to certain aspects, such as their failure to obtain adequate financial assistance from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development or from other sources, including private investors. As a result of this debate the General Assembly adopted resolutions designed to expedite action in the field of economic development. In the report to Congress for the year 1947 attention was called to the danger in which the Council found itself of being diverted to essentially political debates arising from ideological differences between the Soviet Union and most of the other Members of the United Nations. Unfortunately the tendency to introduce into the deliberations of the Council political arguments not relevant to the matters at hand continued during 1948 in even more pronounced form and materially hindered the constructive work of the Council. Speeches made by the Representatives of the Soviet Union, Byelorussia, and Poland-frequently of a political propagandistic nature-together took up more than one third of the total time used by all 18 members of the Council at its Seventh Session. At the close of the Session there remained for consideration 11 items on the agenda which 'could not be dealt with for lack of time and which had to be postponed to later sessions. When the United Nations came into being three years ago, many people felt that the work of the Economic and Social Council in promoting international action to ameliorate economic and social distress would in time prove more important for the peace than the accomplishments of the United Nations in political and security matters. Today some people are disappointed in what the Council has done, or rather has failed to do. There is a noticeable tendency-evident abroad as well as at home-to censure the Council for having produced little in the way of concrete achievement or for having proceeded too slowly in taking up its important tasks. These criticisms reflect in part a misunderstanding of the nature of the Council's role in the United Nations system and in part a natural desire for quick results. It is important that Americans-and the people of other states Members of the United Nations-acquire a true appreciation of the proper role of the Council in order to judge its performance accurately and avoid an unnecessary sense of defeatism. The Council is not an operating agency possessed of specific powers to accomplish particular, concrete ends. Hence its activities do not lead to "results" in the shape of definite actions to remedy immediate situations. Rather, the Council is primarily an advisory and recom |