ABSTRACT
In 1948, the newly born United Nations (UN) General Assembly was entrusted with the difficult task of making a final and binding recommendation with respect to the problem of Italy’s prefascist colonies (Libya, Eritrea, and Italian Somaliland). Italy and Great Britain formulated the Bevin-Sforza plan as a solution, but since the document embodied old colonial ideas of self-aggrandizement, it represented an attempt to bypass one of the basic tenets of the UN Charter: the principle of self-determination. In fact, because it was so heavily influenced by concerns about Cold War politics and national prestige, the Bevin-Sforza plan ignored the wishes and interests of the native populations. The UN finally rejected the agreement, demonstrating the effectiveness of the General Assembly in upholding the UN principles. What happened afterward, unfortunately, showed the total ineffectiveness of the Chapters XI and XII of the charter. These could neither stop self-interested British manipulations of Libya and Ethiopia’s emerging territorial claims that ignored the Eritrean people’s right to self-determination, nor could they prevent the disasters of the ten-year Italian trusteeship in Somaliland. The old logic of politics had resurfaced once again.
