884.6363 African Exploration and Development Corp./6

The British Chargé (Osborne) to the Secretary of State

Aide-Mémoire

His Britannic Majesty’s Chargé d’Affaires has received telegraphic instructions from Sir Samuel Hoare to invite the Secretary of [Page 779] State’s attention to the report published in this morning’s papers regarding the concession alleged to have been obtained by Mr. F. W. Rickett for the “African Exploitation [Exploration] and Development Corporation” for sole rights to oil, mineral and other natural resources in Eastern and Southern Abyssinia for a period of 75 years and regarding the negotiations said to be in progress concerning the development of the Lake Tsana dam.

Mr. Osborne is directed to inform Mr. Cordell Hull that the position of His Majesty’s Government is as set forth in the following statement which has been communicated to the press:—

His Majesty’s Government have no information about the reported concession granted by the Ethiopian Government to an Anglo-American financial group represented by Mr. Rickett at Addis Ababa and, until official confirmation has been received as to real facts, they are disinclined to attach undue importance to this information. No official or unofficial support whatever has been given to Mr. Rickett by His Majesty’s Government, who have made it clear on several occasions that they have no Imperial economic interests in Abyssinia except Lake Tsana, and even on that question Mr. Eden stated in the House of Commons on July 9th that His Majesty’s Government had informed the Ethiopian Government that they favoured postponement of any agreement on the grounds that they did not wish to take any step which might aggravate the present unfortunate controversy between Italy and Abyssinia at a moment when they were using their best endeavours to secure a solution. His Majesty’s Government, though mindful of the interests of Egypt and the Sudan in the Upper Basin of the Blue Nile, were content to await a more suitable moment before pressing forward with this scheme.

It stands to reason therefore that the last thing that His Majesty’s Government would have thought of doing in present circumstances would be to give any support or encouragement of any nature to an enterprise of this character.