1.
SV Conference
0.04

2.
STV. Two party members writing
0.07

3.
SCU PAN Jamali, Chehade Khoury, Toufic Abouchanab and Joubran Hallal
0.18

4.
FULL CU PAN..Hallal, Abbas Sabbous, Chawki Baghdad
0.22

5.
FULL CU. Jamali
0.27

6.
STV PAN All members seated
0.38



Initials KJ/JF/ES



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: At a press conference in Damascus, August 10, sixteen prominent Syrian Communists announced their resignation from the Communist Party on the grounds that the party had "betrayed the national aspirations of the Arabs".

This is in keeping with the United Arab Republic's general policy of accepting technical and financial aid from Communist countries, at the same time trying to keep well clear of the implications of Communist ideology.

Among the sixteen ex-Communists were Professor of Linguistics Chehade Khoury; Professors of Mathematics Abbas Sabbous and Toufic Abouchanab; Party Secretary for Northern Syria Joubran Hallal; writer Chawki Baghdad; and Abdul Baki Jamali, editor and publisher of the former Syrian Communist party newspaper "Al Nur" which closed down early this year.

Jamali said at the press conference the paper had been printed since 1955 on machines from East Germany, at annual expenses equivalent to GBP15,000. It had no income since it was distributed free, and was financed by "foreign quarters with ideological and intellectual relations with the Communist party in Syria".