721.2315/182: Telegram
The Ambassador in Peru (Poindexter) to the Secretary of State
[Received 4:08 p.m.]
13. Supplementing my 12,13 yesterday I addressed a note to President Leguía asking him if he had forwarded the instructions to his Ambassador agreed to in my conversation with him March 1st, as reported in my cable No. 10.14 In response I at once received a request to call from the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Complying at once I was astonished when he told me that the President, after consulting with him, was unable to give the instructions referred to. He stated that when the President agreed, he, the President, had overlooked the fact that the second suggestion of the Secretary of [Page 459] State had been reinserted in the procès-verbal. (See my 9, section 2.)15 You will remember that the first proposal of the President and Minister for Foreign Affairs was to omit this in their instruction and that it was reinserted at my instance. I expressed surprise at this statement of the Minister informing him that I had already advised you that the President would cable Dr. Velarde the aforesaid instructions and then adverted to many inconsistencies in the various positions taken by the Peruvian Government.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs immediately after my conversation with him visited the President and informed him thereof. As a result the Minister for Foreign Affairs again requested me to call and I have just returned from the Foreign Office. He expressed great embarrassment, going at length into the contention of Brazil, and attempted to show that the situation [in] regard to the subject matter of the treaty had changed since it was signed, all of which I will report at length by next pouch. However, he concluded by promising to send at once to Ambassador Velarde the instructions as described in my previous telegram 12, of which I have from him a written copy.