Of Human Bondage

Under the sponsorship of the United Nations, representatives of 51 countries gathered in Geneva's ornate Palais des Nations to deal with a problem which presumably was settled in the 19th century. The idea was to adopt a new international convention against "slavery, the slave trade and institutions and practices similar to slavery," but this week as the conference drew to a close, it proved impossible for nations of the world to cooperate effectively to abolish the most primitive form of human bondage.

Britain and France wanted the carrying of slaves by sea to be labeled "an act of piracy"1--a move that would permit search and seizure of suspected slave ships. Most directly affected by this proposal was Saudi Arabia, which, with the small-fry nations around it on the Arabian Peninsula, constitutes the only area of the world where slavery survives in its classic form. To meet the demand of oil-rich Saudis, who are prepared to pay up to $1,000 for a likely young Arab girl, traders annually import some 30,000 slaves from

Africa, Iran and Iraq. Some of these recruits to slavery are captured or kidnaped in their native villages; others are lured to Mecca on alleged pilgrimages, then sold in the slave market of the Holy City. Most have to be ferried into Arabia across the Red Sea or Persian Gulf. If the British Navy, under the proposed "piracy" clause, resumed its vigorous, pre-World War I slave patrol in the Red Sea and Indian Ocean, this lucrative traffic would be severely hampered.

Jamil M. Baroody, the brooding, hot-tempered Lebanese who was Saudi Arabia's unofficial observer at the conference, did not deny that slavery existed in Arabia. "Slaves," he snorted. "What are slaves? It is better to call them servants or stewards. They have a good life. They call their master 'Uncle.'" But he insisted that the proposal that slave ships be subject to seizure was an "imperialist device"--a typical trick of Western colonialism. Responding to the words "imperialism" and "colonialism" like fire horses to the bell, Asian and African nations lined up alongside Saudi Arabia, and were joined by the Soviet Union, always ready to have a go at the "imperialists." Sensitive to the colonial taunt, the British and French retreated, and settled for a declaration that slavery is a bad thing.

Just as nervously, the U.S. sat the whole thing out. Early in the conference, U.S. Delegate Walter Kotschnig announced that the U.S. would not participate in the debate and voting, nor would it sign the new antislavery convention no matter what it said. The State Department's avowed reason for its position was that because of Senator John Bricker's repeated assaults on the President's treaty-making power, "our present Administration feels it cannot sign treaties affecting internal problems." The likelier reason, which no one would admit to, is that the U.S. did not wish to offend King Saud, and thereby endanger the Dhahran airbase negotiations or Aram-co's valuable oil interests in Saudi Arabia.

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