The Reminiscences of Zafrulla Khan — Page 248
232 REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN and the conduct of business and to see how it is running and what adjustments are needed. That is paid for by the United Nations. Every alternate Thursday, the President entertains a score of press representatives in rotation, to keep in touch with the press socially. In turn the press offers a certain amount of hospitality to the President. He receives so much hospitality that he must return it in some way or other. The Secretary-General and the President give a big reception about the middle of the session, which costs quite a lot of money, but it is the government of the country whose representative the President is who bears his share of the cost. People have sometimes said to me, "You must receive a tremendous salary as President. " There is no question of salary; it is a purely honorary office. R R R R R INTERVIEW - NOVEMBER 17, 1963 Question : Now, Sir Zafrulla, if we may consider two last points in this discussion of the United Nations General Assembly. The first is that during the League period, certain elder statesmen, people who played an enormous role in the founding and also in the conduct of business, became a group of senior Senators, that is, elder statesmen, and carried over their enormous influence and knowledge and became a body within the body around which all sorts of structural and procedural matters crystallized. Do you think that sort of thing is happening in the UN, as an ex-President, with other ex-Presidents? Do you have the feeling that there is a body of very mature people growing out of this experience ? Zafrulla : That was so certainly during the first 10 years of the United Nations and was not necessarily confined to the President and ex- Presidents; though, of course, they counted. Take a personality like that of the late Senator Warren Austin. He was never President and could not have been because he represented the United States. But he was respected and trusted, and he had those qualities that won people's confidence and affection. I always thought he was much abler and cleverer than people gave him credit for. There were other people: for instance, General Romulo, Nasrollah Entezam, Prince Wan, from among the Asians: all of them became