881.843/6

The Diplomatic Agent and Consul General at Tangier ( Blake ) to the Secretary of State

No. 403

Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the Department’s cable No. 11, dated June 6th, 1929, 5 p.m., inquiring as to the method by which the tariff of the Tangier Port Concession Company was effected.

In reply, I would inform the Department that the Tariff of Berth Dues, substituting the changes mentioned in the Act of Algeciras for sojourn and anchorage dues, referred to in my Despatch No. 389 of May 7th, 1929, were not included in the Vizirial Decree instituting the new tariff which was the subject of this Diplomatic Agency’s Despatch No. 286 of August 12th, 1924.69

The “Cahier des Charges” of the Tangier Port Concession, sets forth a table of the maximum harbor dues and port charges which may be levied by the Tangier Port Concession Company. In the “Cahier des Charges,” as revised for the purpose of accommodating the concession to the Convention of 1923 respecting the International Regime for Tangier, a clause was inserted to the effect that the Tangier Port Commission, created under Article 41 of the Tangier Convention, must approve any proposition of the maximum tariffs of the aforementioned “Cahier des Charges,” which the Port Concession Company might propose to apply.

These tariffs have undergone various changes since the institution of the “International” regime, but the printed tariff annexed hereto, in the French text,69 contains the scale of charges, in operation at the present time, which have received the approval of the Tangier Port Commission. A practical translation in English of this tariff will be found in a report from this office, dated September 15th, 1928,69 entitled: “Data Regarding Foreign Ports,” drawn up in reply to the Department’s Instruction of May 24th, 1928, (File No. 800.1561/1[11]).69 This tariff of charges is below the maximum tariff as defined in the deed of concession.

So far as concerns the Moorish Government and the Powers which have adhered to the Tangier Convention, the application of a tariff, proposed by the Tangier Port Concession Company within the limits of the charges stipulated in the “Cahier des Charges,” becomes legal by the approval of the above mentioned Port Commission, which is composed and functions under the provisions of Article 41 of the Convention Regarding the Organization of the Statute of the Tangier Zone, signed at Paris, December 18th, 1923.

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The tariff must, of course, be approved by the American Government before it can become legally binding on American citizens and proteges.

I have [etc.]

Maxwell Blake
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