The World - News from May 11, 1989

Soviet Bloc delegations and the West joined forces at the World Health Organization’s annual conference in Geneva, voting to delay for two days a decision on the Palestine Liberation Organization’s bid for full membership. The vote was 56-47 with 20 abstentions, mostly by Latin American countries, according to an unofficial tally. Two draft resolutions are before the U.N. agency’s assembly. One, sponsored by all 21 Arab members, would have the organization decide “to admit the state of Palestine.” The other, designed to avert a showdown with the United States, which has threated to halt payments to the agency, would combine deferral of the issue until the 1990 assembly with a call for more aid to Palestinians in lands occupied by Israel.