Legation of
the United States,
Constantinople, March 1, 1884.
(Received March 21.)
No. 340.]
You will please excuse a remark explanatory of a point in my telegram to you,
dated yesterday. I say therein, “Indemnity and punishment refused in each
case.” In reading the inclosed reply of the minister you may possibly be
attracted by his repeated references to the action of the judiciary
tribunals of Bitlis. That, I beg to say, is nothing. The tribunals of that
province cannot be relied upon to do justice. They have been already fully
appealed to in these cases. To refer us to them is simply a refusal of
redress. In that view I telegraphed you.
[Inclosure in No.
340.—Translation.]
Aarifi Pasha to Mr.
Wallace.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Sublime Porte, February 27,
1884.
Monsieur l’Envoyé: I have had the honor to
receive the note your excellency kindly addressed to me on the 24th of
January last, No. 198, relative to the aggression Messrs. Knapp and
Reynolds have been subjected to in the vicinity of Ghuvrié.
Whichever may be the contradictions which exist between the information
which has reached the legation of the United States and that furnished
to us by the imperial authorities of the vilayet of Bitlis, your
excellency will permit me, before knowing the result of the
correspondence in which I have engaged upon this subject with the
competent ministry, not to desist from the affirmations of the local
authorities which have insisted over and over again that they have
fulfilled their duties since the beginning, and if the culprits have not
yet received their punishment it is not their fault, as they have given
to this affair a continued attention and vigilance.
The justice being busy with the case, it is of necessity to let it have
its regular course, and if there are some delays, evidently the fault
should not be thrown upon the authorities.
In fact, your excellency will kindly admit that in all the countries of
the earth, often the circumstances amidst which occurrences of such a
kind take place, and the difficulties which are most of the time
inherent, place the justice in the impossibility of deciding with all
the promptitude and celerity desirable. It has never been disputed that
its duty is to surround itself with the greatest precautions to bring
the
[Page 549]
light so as not to have
later to reproach itself with the fatal consequences of a judicial
error.
I can but beg your excellency to be kind enough to leave to the competent
authorities the care of doing their duty. You may be assured that we
will do all that is possible for us to do in order to put an end to the
contradictions which subsist between the information furnished on both
sides, and to accelerate the course of the affair, within the limits,
bovver, which the independence of the judicial power imposes upon
us.
For all these reasons the demand for indemnity presented by your
excellency cannot be taken in consideration; the more so as the laws of
the Empire in no case permit it.
I am in the firm hope that in your enlightened sentiment your excellency
will recognize the justness of the preceding appreciations.
I avail, &c.,
