Magyar Egyház, 1957 (36. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1957-10-01 / 10. szám
10 MAGYAR EGYHÁZ The United Nations Report On the Problem of Hungary Almost a year has passed since the Hungarian uprising of October and November, 1956. The revolt itself has been long since crushed by Soviet military forces. Yet today the Hungarian problem is more than ever in the spotlight of world attention. The passage of ten months has sharpened rather than obliterated it. One reason is the report submitted in June to the United Nations by the five-nation special committee which investigated the Hungarian situation. That report is 150,000 words long, and it is packed with solid information — facts, statistics and verified eyewitness accounts of the historic days of last October and November. In a unanimous opinion of its five members, drawn from countries in each of the continents of: the world — Denmark, Australia, Ceylon, Tunisia and Uruguay — the report found that the Hungarian freedom revolt was a “spontaneous national uprising,’’ and that it was suppressed by “massive armed: intervention” on the part of the Soviet Union. On September 14, after heated debate, the U.N. General Assembly approved overwhelmingly a resolution, sponsored by 37 countries, which endorses the report by the special committee on Hungary and calls on both the Soviet authorities and the Kadar government to cease repressive measures against the Hungarian people. The resolution further names Prince Wan of Thailand, President of the last General Assembly, as special United Nations representative to seek Soviet withdrawal from Hungary. The official report on which the U.N. acted is long and detailed, and has to be translated into many languages and distributed throughout the world. It will take several months for it to achieve even a limited international circulation. The contents of the report on the problem of Hungary, however, should be known far and wide. The U.N. delegate from the Philippines pointed out the reason why, when he observed recently that all the small nations of the world have a particular interest in the Hungarian tragedy. Today, he said, it is Hungary which is the victim of foreign aggression; tomorrow it may be any other small state. In order to give the substance of the report the widest possible publicity and to speed its distribution, two summaries of the full U.N. document are now available in quantity. One summary was published by the official UNITED NATIONS REVIEW; the other by TIME MAGAZINE. Free reprints of both these admirable summaries may be obtained by our readers by writing to the editor of this newspaper or to the Common Council! for American Unity, 20 West 40th Street, New York Since the summaries of the U.N. report on Hungary deal with a tragic story that has moved people everywhere, our relatives and friends abroad would be very much interested in reading an impartial and accurate account of the Hungarian uprising. It would seem an excellent idea to enclose copies of the summaries, after we have read them, in our letters from America, to countries where that kind of correspondence is possible. CHURCH WORLD SERVICE LEADER CRITICIZES IMMIGRATION BILL The emergency immigration bill passed by the U.S. Congress is a “sad let-down” for the more than 30,000 Hungarians now in the United States, according to Dr. R. Norris Wilson, executive director of Church World Service. Because Congress failed to amend present laws and practices, the Hungarian refugees may be deported at any time, he said. “We welcomed these courageous people, and the government gave them the doubtful status of ‘parolees’. But as parolees these young people — the flower of their nation’s youth — have no rights whatever. And according to present laws they are in danger of being seized and deported at any time.” Dr. Wilson said that 6,000 refugees had been resettled in the U.S. through Church World Service, and consequently the organization is “deeply concerned at the deportation threat that hangs over their heads. The position in which the United States has put the Hungarian refugees is in fact un-American and untenable. We can only hope that the Congress very early in the next session will take steps necessary to correct this ambiguous status of the Hungarian parolees and give them their ordinary, common rights.” E.P.S., Geneva ★ NATIONAL COUNCIL GENERAL BOARD SPEAKS ON HUNGARIAN REFUGEES Corruption in labor unions, integration of public schools and the plight of Middle East refugees and the Hungarian people were central objects of concern to the National Council of Churches General Board, meeting in New York, October 2-3. Church people must be informed of the findings of a special UN Committee that condemned USSR intervention in Hungary, declared an unanimous resolution. The Board also urged that the status of Hungarian “parolee” refugees in this country be regularized by Congress to prevent further deportations of them without benefit of hearings or appeal. A major statement called on organized labor to “eliminate corruption and undemocratic practices” in its ranks. Mrs. Theodore O. Wedel of Washington, D.C., president of United Church Women, initiated the statement, which also commended those union members and leaders who are working for a “strong, healthy trade union movement.” In three resolutions the Board also commended President Eisenhower for his actions in upholding the law in little Rock; praised “many churches and individual Christians” for their “Christian stand for justice with reconciliation, for law with self-discipline”; and authorized the National Council’s Department of Racial and Cultural Relations to “convey the Council’s concern in these and other situations of tension.” On receiving a special report on the situation facing the nearly one million refugees in the Middle East, the Board urged more generous support of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNWRA); increased support of Church World Service projects in that area; and examination of the possibility for local U.S. communities to “adopt” frontier Arab villages. Almost one million dollars in cash and four million dollars in goods have been sent to the area by U.S. churches through Church World Service since 1948, the report indicated.
