UN General Assembly
1948

The Australian delegation deplored the way in which the right to individual opposition had been misused in that matter. It had consistently maintained that no nation had the right, except on the grounds of qualification expressly provided in the Charter, to refuse admission to any applicant State, and that view had recently been upheld by the International Court of Justice (A/597). The Court had laid down that every application for admission should receive individual consideration on its own merits, and that no Member State could make its consent to the admission of an applicant dependent on the admission of other applicants. Nevertheless, the Australian delegation could not accept the view put forward by the Argentine delegation that the General Assembly had the right to admit to membership a nation which had secured the support of the majority of the Security Council, but not of all the five members entitled to exercise their right of veto. Such action would be contrary to Article 4 of the Charter. Australia had never sought to infringe the Charter; it had stood firmly for the observance of the Charter by great and small Powers alike even when, as in the case of the veto, the result was contrary to its wishes. Mr. Beasley supported the USSR in resisting infringement of Article 4 of the Charter, but asked that country to show the same respect for the Charter in exercising its right of veto.