Origins of the NAM
The Non-aligned Movement is an organisation that includes many of the countries that rejected the opportunity to join the political blocs of the East and the West during the Cold War. Its main priorities are to ensure the peaceful coexistance of each member state and to respect its sovereignity, integrity and ability of each state to cope with its internal affairs intependantly, while trying to provide a haven for countries that are not aligned with others to collectively deal with issues, for example medical and debt problems, they many encounter.
The origin of the organisation is considered to be a part of the famous speech of the Indian Prime Minister in 1954 in Sri Lanka. In that famous speech the Prime Minister described 5 crucial pillars for the Sino-Indian international relations which later became of essential meaning for the main goals of the movement. Prior to its establishment, independant states that did not want to join either the West or the East in the Cold War were unofficially known as non-aligned nations.
The core principles that the Indian Prime Minister described and later the Chinese Prime Minister put forth were basic for the peace establishment between the states included in the movement. These were the mutual respect for territorial and social integrity and severeignity, the proclamation of non-aggression, respect for each state’s ability to resolve and maintain its domestic affairs, the mutual benefit and the peaceful coexistance. These core principles were embodied in the declaration of the movement. which was significantly influenced by the famous Bandung Conference in 1955 in which the independant Asian and African states took part.
These are the basic points that led to the establishment of the movement and in 1961 the member states had the first NAM Summit, organised by the Yogoslav President Tito inBelgrade where the main aims, programs, priorities and responsibilities of the movement were discussed and later new goals for the countries were included.