President-elect Richard M. Nixon and his senior foreign affairs advisers are "fully aware" of a need for a cooperative United States, policy, toward Latin America, David Rockefeller said yesterday.
Mr. Rockefeller, president of the Chase Manhattan Bank, added in a speech here that the post of Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs in the new Administration had not yet been filled because Mr. Nixon was "stilI looking for the right man."
The lack of an appointee to this post as the Inauguration neared should not be interpreted as a sign of uninterest toward Latin-America, added Mr. Rockefeller, whose bank does a major part of its foreign business in Latin America.
Mr. Rockefeller, who has been a leader among American business executives interested in Latin America, has discussed Inter-American affairs with Dr. Henry A. Kissinger; Mr. Nixon's national security adviser, and William, P. Rogers,the incomg President's choice for Secretary of State.
There has been no indication yet from Mr. Nixon, either in the campaign or since his election, whether he plans to continue the Alliance for Progress program for Latin-American economic and social development as it was operated by the preceding Democratic Administrations.
Mr. Rockefeller spoke at a luncheon meeting inaugurating the activities of the Organization of American States Association, a private organization of American States Association, a private organization with heavy representation from the business world. It will seek to mobilize support for the Inter-American organization.
Among the 60 luncheaon guests was Galo plaza. Secretary General of the Organization of American States amd a former President of Ecuador.
The luncheon was held a the center for Inter-American Relations, 680 Park Avenue. Mr. Rockerfeller is chairman of the center.
Adolf A. Berle Jr., who has been an adviser to Presidents on Inter-American affairs since the first Roosevelt Administration, said at the meeting that there should be close cooperation between American corporations doing business in Latin America and the O.A.S.
Mr. Berle, vho is president From the New York of the 20th-Century Fund, which conducts studies of contemporary problems, proposed that discussions be undertaken by American corporations with the O.A.S. to work out "norms and principles" for foreign investments in Latin America.
This proposal reflects growing concern in the United States business circles over nationalist attitudes in Latin America toward foreign investments, highlighted by the seizure by Peru's miliatary government of a wholely-owned subsidary of Standard Oil of New Jersey.
Mr. Berle said that the Inter-American system should rest on a "common system of defense"for the hemisphere and on a "cooperative syystem" of economic relations because "no country today can develop its economy within the limits of its own borders."
In an apparent allusion to Cuba, he commented that the "social structure of every Latin American country is its own affair."
"If the people of a country decide to be Communist, that is their business," he said but added that the O.A.S. common defense system should resist having such a system imposed on a country.
