Remarks at Governor Rockefeller's News Briefing on His Report on Latin America.

Ladies and gentlemen:

You have already had distributed to you the copies of the Rockefeller report.

And Governor Rockefeller is here to answer questions on that report or any other questions on our Latin American policy which you would like to ask him.

Before he answers those questions, I would like to say a word about that report and the part that it has played in developing our Latin American policy.

There have been numbers of reports on Latin America that have been made by various missions, going back over the 20 years that I recall studying Latin American policy. This is by far the most comprehensive, with 83 specific recommendations for action. Also, I believe that this report will see more of its recommendations implemented by action than any report on Latin America ever made.

Several of the recommendations in the report were implemented in my speech of the 31st.

There are others, which are under active consideration within the administration at the present time, which Governor Rockefeller will be glad to discuss in answer to your questions. Two particularly I would like to mention.

One is with regard to debt service. I had only one brief paragraph in my speech on debt service because we have not yet completed our studies on this matter. But I think the very imaginative recommendations that were made by the Rockefeller committee, and particularly by George Woods,¹ deserve not only the most active consideration, but deserve implementation within the administration, and Governor Rockefeller will be discussing the recommendations that are made.

¹George D. Woods, senior adviser on Governor Rockefeller's mission to Latin America.

I do not mean implementation exactly as recommended, because this involves a number of financial details with which I am not familiar. But I think this is the direction toward which this very basic problem of debt service, which plagues virtually every country in Latin America--this is the direction in which we should move.

The other is with regard to trade preferences. You will have noted in my speech I referred to the necessity for having special trade preferences for all the developing countries. I pointed out that there were countries outside of the Western Hemisphere that had special relationships with other countries, and particularly their former colonial countries, and that our first step would be to attempt to work out a general system of trade preferences which would apply equally and fairly to all of the developing countries, including those of Latin America.

We are beginning to implement that recommendation as contained in my speech. However, the Rockefeller report indicates that, if it is not possible to work out a satisfactory arrangement in the direction of implementing a recommendation for trade preferences for all the developing countries because of the ties that many of those countries will have with former colonial nations, then the goal that we have is to have special trade preferences for Latin America.

This incidentally is not a new goal as far as I am concerned. The Governor will remember I recommended this in 1958 when I returned. He has been recommending it long before that.

But our goal is overall trade preferences for all the developing countries, but specifically and particularly for Latin America, if it is not possible to work it out for all.

These two points I wanted to emphasize before presenting the Governor.

Now, Governor, you are welcome to answer any questions, and if you will expand on the debt service thing particularly.