UN General Assembly
1961

220. The time is past and gone when the wishes of the indigenous peoples of Rwanda and Burundi were a matter for outside interpretation. Free elections held under the supervision of United Nations observers have brought to power Governments with which rests the sole authority to decide on the internal institutions of their respective countries and on such forms of external association as they may see fit to adopt. 221. My Government will be the first to respect the will of Rwanda and Burundi, and it hopes that on this basis the close bonds of friendship and fraternal co-operation which already exist between us will be consolidated and established within the new context of the two countries' imminent accession to independence.