811.516 Export-Import Bank/7–2144
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Haiti ( Wilson )
The Department refers to the Embassy’s despatch no. 106 of July 21, 1944, enclosing a copy of the note from the Haitian Foreign Office dated July 14, 1944,27 regarding amortization of the Haitian six percent dollar bonds and of the Export-Import Bank loan.
The Department observes that the Haitian Government plans to pay $800,000 for amortization of the notes held by the Bank and $350,000 for amortization of the six percent bonds. The Department has noticed also the Haitian statements that the unobligated treasury balance at the end of the current year will be between $1,200,000 and $1,400,000, and that the proposed amortization would be made from this balance. Finally, the Department has taken note of the request of the Haitian Government for the Department’s assistance in arriving at a new agreement with the Foreign Bondholders Protective Council, Incorporated.
This matter has been considered carefully in the Department and the conclusion has been reached that the Department can not support an approach to the Foreign Bondholders Protective Council on a basis of less than $700,000 for amortization on the Haitian 6’s during 1944–45. For the information of the Embassy a memorandum of a conversation between officers of the Department and the Haitian Ambassador and Second Secretary is enclosed.28 The Embassy will find therein an indication of the factors considered by the Department in arriving at the conclusion stated above. It will be noted that the figure of $700,000 is not one introduced for purposes of discussion with the Haitian Government, but represents the Department’s decision as to a minimum which it would be prepared to support with the Council, as fair to the bondholders, under existing conditions.
The Department suggests that the Embassy make appropriate reply to the Haitian Government’s note of July 14, 1944, in the sense indicated in the first sentence of the preceding paragraph.