883.24/12–3044
The Egyptian Minister (Hassan) to the Secretary of State
The Egyptian Minister presents his compliments to the honourable the Secretary of State and has the honour to inform him that the Egyptian Government, after having carefully studied the Surplus Property Act of October 3, 194412 which provides that surplus farm commodities shall not be sold in the United States at prices less than those applicable with respect to sales of such commodities by the Commodity Credit Corporation and authorizes the latter to dispose of any farm products for export without regard to price restrictions, has instructed the Minister to manifest to the American Government Egypt’s apprehension over the ruinous repercussions to the Egyptian cotton prices as a result of exports of United States cotton at prices below those in the United States.
Egypt depends almost exclusively on her cotton and its price is now considerably lower than the corresponding grades in the United States. Sales of United States cotton at lower prices to meet the competitive prices of cotton outside the United States would be tantamount to a subsidy. Such artificial means was provided in 1939 when subsidies were established. As that was so harmful to all other cotton producing countries these subsidies were reduced and finally stopped. Such methods as subsidies and other artificial measures, prevalent before this war, were hindrances to world trade and have now been disclaimed by the spokesmen of the United Nations in all the Conferences which lately took place under the sponsorship of the United States Government.
The avowed policy of the United Nations championed by the United States Government is free trade. The provision of subsidies runs counter to this principle. It is contradictory to the liberal principles [Page 96] on which the Atlantic Charter13 is based and is not of a nature to assure success of the work of International Conferences and the discussions undertaken by the United States Economic Missions14 to increase trade between the different nations.
The Egyptian Government is therefore confident that the United States Government in the application of the Surplus Property Act will not deviate from the lofty liberal economic principles which the State Department has championed and the United Nations have bound themselves to follow.
The Egyptian Minister avails [etc.]
- 58 Stat. 765.↩
- Joint Statement by President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Churchill, August 14, 1941, Foreign Relations, 1941, vol. i, p. 367.↩
- Apparently a reference to the Special Economic Mission to the Middle East; for documentation regarding this subject, see ibid., 1944, vol. v, pp. 38 ff.↩