501.BC Kashmir/12–2848
Memorandum of Conversation, by the First Secretary of Embassy in India (Parsons)1
| Participants: | Dr. Alfredo Lozano, Member United Nations Commission on India and Pakistan. |
| The Honorable Loy W. Henderson, American Ambassador to India. | |
| J. Graham Parsons, First Secretary. |
Dr. Lozano called at 4 p. m. and described in the strictest confidence the course of his efforts to persuade the Indian Government to accept UNCIP’s December 11 proposals. The gist of this conversation was reported in the Embassy’s telegram of the following day but the additional supplementary points may be of interest.
Dr. Lozano had with him but did not offer to leave with the Ambassador two memoranda drafted by Sir Girja Bajpai and approved by Nehru and the Cabinet on December 22. These memoranda contained Bajpai’s version of Dr. Lozano’s elucidation of the December 11 proposals and the Indian Government’s interpretation thereof and it was intended that they should be agreed to by the Commission on the one hand and the Government of India on the other. Inasmuch as the memoranda as originally drafted would in Dr. Lozano’s opinion have modified the Commission’s proposals he had explained that he had no authority to consent to modifications or to negotiate in that direction. His efforts therefore were directed at ensuring that his own elucidations, as contained in the memoranda, adhered strictly to the intent of the proposals. He said that he was not concerned with what the Government of India might say by way of interpretation inasmuch as that did not commit the Commission.
Following discussion of the various modifications which the Indian Government had tried very subtly to introduce, apparently with the intent of reserving to itself a freedom of action which the proposals themselves did not envisage, the Ambassador pointed out the importance of stressing still further to Sir Girja that the Commission was not committed by the Indian Government’s interpretations; whereas the latter, if it accepted the proposals, was fully committed to a definite course of action. The conversation revealed that Bajpai was still embarrassed by his failure to make clear to his Government that the Commission would have the ultimate authority as to the disposition of [Page 480] Indian forces following withdrawal of the Pakistan troops and tribesmen.
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- Transmitted to the Department by the Ambassador in his despatch No. 1394, December 28; received January 12, 1949, not printed.↩