611.60F31/194: Telegram

The Minister in Czechoslovakia (Wright) to the Secretary of State

22. Substance of your 9, April 12, 7 p.m., communicated on 13th instant to Stangler supported by aide-mémoire. He informed me orally that the wording of the aide-mémoire of Foreign Office of April 7, while perhaps not as exactly worded as it might have been was intended to convey willingness to define and limit the preferences it may wish to reserve the right to accord in derogation of most favored nation treatment, using as a basis for discussion the principles enumerated in the aide-mémoire of November 27, 1935, within the meaning and intent of that sentence of the aforesaid aide-mémoire reading “such comment as the Czechoslovak Government may offer in reference [Page 244] to the foregoing considerations will be received with interest and will be given careful consideration”. The text of this portion of this telegram has been submitted to and confirmed by Stangler in writing.

He informs me confidentially that an example of the reason for invoking this proviso with regard to the principles contained in the 1935 aide-mémoire is the inability of his Government at present to fulfill the undertaking that all measures shall be “publicly announced” because in such cases as the treaty with Austria,12 other governments parties to agreements will not consent to publication although this Government is willing at all times to do so. He said, however, that this was not to be interpreted as any lack of desire or intention to make all such agreements known to us and that if a trade agreement should be concluded upon such general principles his Government would undertake so to inform us.

Weight
  1. Commercial agreement supplement to Agreement of May 4, 1921, signed April 2, 1936; League of Nations Treaty Series, vol. clxxx, p. 51.