UNITED NATIONS British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher said western allies support President Reagan’s proposal to discuss Third World conflicts at his November summit with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev. But “arms control is not being downgraded as a summit priority,” she said at a news conference after meeting on Thursday with Reagan and the leaders of Canada, Italy, Japan and West Germany. “We all fully support President Reagan in his efforts in Geneva and we believe there could be no question of ever separating Europe from the United States or dividing this alliance,” Mrs. Thatcher said following the meeting at the U.S. mission to the United Nations. Reagan, in a speech to the United Nations at its 40th anniversary session Thursday, suggested the Nov. 1920 superpower summit include an attempt to settle conflicts in Third World Nations, a shift from the previous focus of reducing stockpiles of nuclear armaments. Reagan listed the regional conflicts as Nicaragua, Angola, Ethiopia, Cambodia and Afghanistan.

Mrs. Thatcher expressed hope that the ReaganGorbachev meeting will “unlock the deadlock” on arms control, but added: “We also believe the main regional conflicts will have to be on the agenda and discussed. In other words, we believe that these talks will have to be very comprehensive talks.”

Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze, who also spoke Thursday, left the General Assembly hall without talking to reporters.

But the Soviet U.N. Ambassador, Oleg Troyanovsky, said Shevardnadze’s own speech should be regarded as a reaction to Reagan.

The Soviet foreign Minister, who spoke after Reagan, also referred to regional wars but cited different examples and offered an opposing view.

He criticized Israeli and South African “terror” and said that in Afghanistan and Nicaragua “hired assassins . . . are killing thousands of people.”

World Sikh News records its grateful appreciation to THE NEW ENGLAND SIKH STUDY CIRCLE, BOSTON, MASS. for its collective support to the weekly newspaper. It is really heartening and gratifying to note that all the members of the New England Sikh Study Circle have become subscribers. We hope that other Sikh organizations and institutions would emulate the. Example set by the Boston Sikhs.

Article extracted from this publication >>  November 1, 1985