Report from Szüts Pál, 'Meeting with North Korean Ahn Gi-son'

Record

Today I received Korean councilor Ahn Gi-son at his request, who inquired about the members and the departure time and date of the Hungarian delegation travelling to the UN General Assembly. I informed him about the members of the delegation and the departure time of the first group.

The comrade told me that he would like to have an opportunity to meet the later departing members of the delegation. In this meeting he will ask the Hungarian delegation to support adding the new proposal to the agenda. In his opinion the situation is developing in a positive direction. The proposal is supported by 28 countries. The negotiations of the two Red Cross organizations also affect the situation positively. Besides all of these, they are aware that the Americans can prevent adding the issue to the agenda. This however does not mean that it was worthless to raise the issue. They want to continue fighting.

Concerning the Red Cross negotiations, he said that they do not touch on the concrete issues of reunification, nevertheless they positively affect problems that need to be solved later. The next phase of the sessions will open on October 20 in Pyongyang, and will be followed by another one in Seoul around November 20.

Inquiring about the exact departure time of the delegation leads me to the conclusion that the Embassy intends to see our delegation off.

Budapest, 1972 September 15.

[Handwritten note]: Comrade Kádár László's copy was sent to Pyongyang by the Regional Division IV.

Budapest, 1972 September 19.