Mennen Williams, assistant secretary State for African Affairs, defended policy in the Congo last night before Hall Forum audience which some 35 students who had picked- the meeting earlier in the evening.

The students, including members of Harvard SDS and May 2nd Movement , marched for some 45 minutes the auditorium carrying signs and "Congo si, Yankee no" and "Stop aid to Tshombe." Signs in English Swahill accused the U.S. of murder in Congo and asserted American policy "as bankrupt as the state of ."

a carefully-prepared, hour-long Williams maintained that the U.S. never had any desire to control the or any other part of Africa," and that direct U.S. investment in the Congo is less than one per cent of the total foreign investment there.

U.S. policy, Williams said, has always been based on support of the central Congolese government and its prime ministers, from Lumumba to Tshombe. He said the U.S. had no forewarning that Congolese President Kasavubu would choose Tshombe as Prime Minister and added that there is "absolutely no truth to the assertion that we encouraged Tshombe's return."

Williams said the U.S., "neither condones nor approves" of the use of white mercenaries in the Congo, but he asserted that the Congolese government "has every legal right" to employ them. He said U.S. military personnel in the Congo consist of some 200 men, mostly air transport crews, and that "we have absolutely no intention to engage U.S. forces in combat operations."