701.9111/682a: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Chargé in Iran (Engert)
5. Department’s 3, January 14, 3 p.m. Daftary called at the Near Eastern Division again on January 20 and said that he had received [Page 751] instructions (1) that an announcement by the Secretary of State regarding the reopening of the Legation was undesirable and (2) that he should present himself “without noise”.
I received Daftary this morning. Reports regarding the reopening of the Legation having come to the attention of press correspondents, one of them raised the question at this morning’s press conference. In replying I confirmed the above-mentioned reports and considered it desirable to add a few informal remarks, the transcript of which follows:
“In reply to a correspondent’s question whether it was correct that the Iranian Legation in Washington had been reopened, the Secretary of State said that he had had the pleasure this morning of meeting the new Iranian Chargé d’Affaires who had reopened his country’s Legation here. The Secretary added that this action came about largely as a result of the recent visit which Mr. Wallace Murray, Chief of the Division of Near Eastern Affairs, had made to Teheran, where he was most courteously received by His Imperial Majesty the Shah. The Secretary pointed out that the reopening of the Legation called to mind the long record of friendship between the two peoples and the confidence which Iran had reposed in us on many past occasions.
“The Secretary expressed the view that the remarkable strides which Iran had made in recent years under the guidance of its able and progressive ruler and the part which Iran had played as a stabilizing force in the Middle East were probably not fully realized or appreciated by our own people. In this latter connection he stated that he had particularly in mind Iran’s sponsorship of the Saadabad Pact, which was a regional agreement designed to promote peace and understanding in Western Asia. Its essential purpose was similar to some of the agreements which we had signed during recent years in this hemisphere, since it contributed definitely toward a regime of order under international law.
“The Secretary called attention to the fact that improvements in the means of communication during the past few years had brought us into closer and closer contact with Iran, resulting in a mutually profitable and growing trade and also in a development and broadening of American-Iranian cultural relations. The Secretary expressed the view that the reopening of the Iranian Legation in Washington would contribute to a further strengthening of these already existing ties and would enable both countries more fully to understand and appreciate the efforts which each was making toward an improvement in the welfare of its people and toward the cause of world peace.”36
You may make such use of the foregoing as may be appropriate and helpful, bearing in mind that the above informal remarks are not to be regarded as an “announcement” but as a necessary procedure under our practice in dealing with the correspondents in order to set as favorable a tone as possible to press comments on the present event.
- Issued as a press release January 25, 1939; printed in Department of State, Press Releases, January 28, 1939, p. 55.↩