UN General Assembly
1969

they are able to develop their own strength, vitality and vigour; secure for their people economic and social gains and foster the habit of meeting together to pursue common objectives. 137. In Asia we are attempting to evolve a strategy for integrated development of regional economic co-operation which represents a well co-ordinated attack on the manifold problems and deficiencies in Asia. The move has been made to provide an Asian answer to Asian problems. What Asia needs today is not military pacts but economic co-operation. 138. Regional economic co-operation, and particularly socio-economic resurgences in Asia can, in the ultimate analysis, be sustained only on the basis of better utilization of Asian resources and a more even distribution of wealth and opportunities within our respective societies. We, in India, have not flinched from taking decisions which alone can ensure that the wealth of the nation is utilized for the welfare of all its peoples without distinction. We have been trying resolutely to work in the context of the phenomenon of rising expectations. In so far as our society is