BRITAIN'S ACTION

New Zealand Herald, Volume 81, Issue 24876, 24 April 1944, Page 3

BRITAIN'S ACTION

DIPLOMATIC SECRECY PARALLEL FROM HISTORY Diplomatic history appears to provide no exact precedent for the action of the British Government in refusing to allow the representatives of neutral Powers accredited to the Court of St. James to send any communications to their governments, unless they have first been censored. According to Professor A. G. Davis, professor of law at Auckland University College, the closest analogy is to be found in the action of the Prussian Government during the siege of Paris in the FrancoPrussian War. Certain diplomatic agents, notably the United States Minister, remained in Paris during the siege. They requested permission to send a diplomatic courier through the German lines. They were informed that letters would he allowed to pass if unclosed, provided they contained nothing objectionable from a military point of view. The diplomats replied that the sending of open despatches would render official relations with their governments impossible. Hi smarclt's answer referred to the fact that the diplomats had not been accredited to the Government of National Defence then exercising control in the city, but he allowed the United States Minister to despatch and receive closed bags once a week, on the ground that the United States_ Minister had charge of the protection of German nationals in the city. Reply by Bismarck Meantime, the United States Secretary of State took the matter up on behalf of all neutrals represented in Paris, contending that no independent State, claiming to be a free agent, could, in self-respect, accept the_ German ruling. The right of free intercourse with their governments was cue of the privileges of envoys. To this protest Bismarck replied that the right of unhindered written intercourse between a government and its diplomatic representatives was, in itself, undisputed. "But," lie continued, "this right may come into conflict with rights which also are beyond dispute, as where a State, to guard against contagious disease, subjects travellers and papers to a quarantine. So, too, in war." Bismarck then quoted the following passage from Vattel, a recognised Swiss authority:—"War us to deprive the enemy ot all his resources, and to prevent him sending Ministers to solicit help. There are even times when we may refuse transit to Ministers of neutral States who propose to_ go to enemy territory. We are not obliged to tolerate their taking to the enemy beneficial advice or their going to^ concert with him about means of giving him assistance. There can be no doubt of this in the case, for example, of a besieged city. But to avoid giving offence to sovereigns, convincing reasons must be given them for the refusal to grant passage to their Ministers and they are bound to be satisfied with these reasons if they claim to remain neutral." Bismarck accordingly refused to alter his decision. Britain a Besieged Fortress Although the United States took a strong line in the communications with Bismarck, a despatch from Secretary Fish to the United States Ambassador to Germany shows he wrt-s willing to admit that the privilege of secret communications between envoys and their governments was not absolute. "The rights of the legation," he wrote, "ought not to be questioned or curtailed unless the attacking party (in the case of a besieged city) has_ good reason to believe that they will be abused, or unless some military necessity, which, upon proper statement must be regarded as obvious, shall require the curtailment." "Mr. Winston Churchill, in the days when the U-boat menace was at its height, likened Britain to a besieged fortress." concluded Professor Davis. "The simile may be appropriately extended to present circumstances. If ever necessity justified curtailment of diplomatic privileges, it certainly does now."