Unboxing a Tragic Memory

Appointment of the New Secretary- General of the United Nations.

- Dr.Sehba ali

The recent appointment of the new Secretory- General of the United Nation's Organization, Mr. Antonio Guterres of Portugal who replaced the incumbent, Ban Ki-moon of South Korea brought to life the long buried memory of the second Secretary-General, Dag Hammarskjold of Sweden who died prematurely in a tragic plane accident in September 1961. He was on a high-risk mission to negotiate with rebels in Katanga, a mineral rich province in Congo that had broken away from the rest of the poorer country with the help of their colonizers, Belgians and other Western governments and businessmen. Pilot error was officially blamed after the D.C. 6 plane carrying the second Secretary- General and sixteen others crashed into the bush In the British protectorate of Northern Rhodesia, now Zambia, killing all of them.

All the evidence pointed to sabotage and the suspects were C.I.A., Belgians and the British but no conclusive evidences were found. The reason for eliminating the Secretory-General was suspected to be their self-interest in the rich minerals in Katanga region, which he was going to take away from them and give to their rightful owners, the poor Congolese. The tragic and premature death of the Secretory-General and his sixteen colleagues was sad enough but equally sad was the reason of their deaths.