De Valera on U N 0
From Our Own Correspondent
DUBLIN
Will Ireland apply for membership of U.N.O.? Not yct, said Mr. de Valera, in a debate on the winding up of the League of Nations, in which Ireland is materially interested.
The League bad been perhaps the greatest experiment in international cooperation the world had ever known. Ile did not agree with the fashion of decrying it. He thought it might achieve its puipose, until its failure in 1931-2 to cope with the attack on China. whereby the Covenant's authority suffered a fatal blow.
The new organisation did not seem to him so satisfactory from the viewpoint of the small nations, although as
the large Powers would have to provide the force to maintain the rule of law they naturally claimed considerable might, but he thought that could be secured in a better way than the present.
It was when the peace treaties came up for signature that Ireland would have to consider whether to apply for membership. Our country always wished to enter a true organisation for the world's security.
Apparently, said Mr. de Valera, only a fraction of human beings are able to look towards the ultimate good and say: the ultimate good being such, we will work for that even though there seems to be an evil at the moment which has to be encountered in order to work out to that ultimate good.