Representative of Uganda maintained that his Government had taken strict precautions to see that none of those refugees were armed and sent to carry out depredations against the neighbors of Uganda.
In terms of percentage of the population of India, the refugees, as was pointed out by the Representative of Greece in the Economic and Social Council debate at its fifty-first session, constitute 2 per cent of the population of India. But we agree that it is a very large number, which we are most anxious to take back under conditions of safety and security which can be certified by the United Nations, if the international community is genuinely interested in seeking a humanitarian solution to this problem and not exploiting it as a weapon to bring about the dismemberment of the territorial integrity of a Member State.
I could say much about displacement of populations elsewhere about mass transfers of human beings, about the denial of the right to return to their homes even after a generation, but I do not think that much purpose would be served by entering into such exchanges, and therefore I say no more on this subject.
We have heard, also, a great deal about the need for a political settlement in East Pakistan. Of course, we know that this is vital to the survival, not only of East Pakistan but also of West Pakistan, but we have been told about the human rights of citizens, about national liberation movements and about democracy. We know that many Member States of the United Nations are not homogeneous States. In fact, many of them claim to be pluralistic societies or multi-national State, but the question arises when Pakistan is told that it should not suppress autonomy, that it should respect the aspirations of the people of East Pakistan-we ask to what extent the right to autonomy demands respect does? Many Representatives of States who tell us this know that in their own countries there is no autonomy; they are unitary States even though ostensibly they are federal in form. Even as federations they are highly centralized States and leave only local powers for the constituent units of a federation.
We in Pakistan would have been able to settle this problem if the demand had not escalated to a break-up of Pakistan, from a federation in to a confederation. We would hope that those who are objective and who truly try to understand the problems of pluralistic societies where there is a diversity of peoples, where society is dichotomous, that they would try to be helpful and to understand and find a solution to this dilemma of reconciliation of the need for preserving the territorial integrity and national unity of a State with the demand for autonomy which is undoubtedly genuine. But, instead we have been pilloried by propaganda and by those who, for reasons of alliance, of politics, wish to take sides and demand that Pakistan should concede the ultimatums that are put forward by elected representatives of the people, not for autonomy but for dismemberment.
We in Pakistan are formulating a political settlement, but regrettably it is not a political settlement that would be to the liking of India which seeks the dismemberment of Pakistan. About this there can be no doubt with the statement of the Prime Minister of India and with the statements of responsible leaders in the Indian Government which
