The decision was announced by Han Seung-soo, president of the 56th GA session, after a long debate on the issue, proposed by Gambia and a very few other countries attempting to include "Taiwan's participation in the UN" in the agenda of the 56th GA session.

Representatives from 91 countries made statements during the debate, and 67 of them, including Britain, France and Russia, the permanent members of the UN Security Council, made clear their opposition to the proposal and reiterated their countries' position of One China policy.

Diplomats from many countries stressed that the issue of "Taiwan's participation in the UN" has already been solved by Resolution 2758 at the 26th General Assembly session and there is no need to further debate about it.

Wang Yingfan, China's permanent representative to the United Nations, told the General Committee that after repeated failure over the past eight years, a small number of countries have once again raised the issue of the so-called "Taiwan's participation inthe United Nations" at this year's session of the General Assembly,in another attempt to create "two Chinas" or "one China, one Taiwan" in the world body.

"This is a violation of the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations as well as General Assembly Resolution 2758," Wang said. "We firmly oppose the inclusion" of the proposal in the agenda of the 56th General Assembly session.

"It is an indisputable objective reality and legal fact widely recognized by the international community that there is only one China in the world and Taiwan has been an inseparable part of China's territory since antiquity," he said.

In early August, Gambia and a few other countries sent a letterto UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, requesting to include in theagenda of the new General Assembly session an item of "Taiwan's participation in the United Nations."

During the debate at the General Committee, the Pakistani representative said that "There is only one China and Taiwan is its integral part. It is an indisputable fact. No amount of questioning or debate can alter this reality."

"The General Committee, year after year, has reached only one conclusion and that is China is the sovereign member state of the United Nations and Taiwan being its integral part has no right whatsoever to claim the membership of this world body," he said.

Also supporting the One China policy were representatives from Afghanistan, Angola, Colombia, Cuba, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), Iran, Italy, Malaysia, Morocco, Nepal, Syria, Spain, Ukraine, and Zambia.

Representative of Burundi, Djibouti and other countries said that it is a sheer waste of time to discuss the already solved issue since the United Nations has a lot of other important issueswhich require prompt discussion.

(eastday.com 09/15/2001)