Foreign Relations of the United States, 1946, Paris Peace Conference: Proceedings, Volume III

CFM Files

United States Delegation Journal

Paris, September 21, 1946, 10 a.m.

USDel (PC) (Journal) 48

The Commission continued discussion of Article 10 and the Dutch-Belgian amendment referring to the existence of the Italo-Austrian accord of September 5 on the rights of the German-speaking inhabitants of the Upper Adige.⁶⁶ The representatives of Byelo-Russia, Yugoslavia and the USSR spoke against the amendment while the representatives of Australia, New Zealand, Belgium and The Netherlands supported it. It was adopted by 13 votes to 6 with 1 abstention. Draft Article 10 was then accepted without comment.

A small subcommission consisting of Yugoslavia and France was appointed to consider the necessity of modifying the language of Article 11 to meet a Yugoslav amendment to this Article (CP(Gen)Doc 1 U 5, last para.). M. Bebler (Yugoslavia) introduced and supported his delegation’s second amendment to Article 11 (CP(Gen) Doc 1 U 6) regarding the return of archives, art and historic objects removed from Yugoslavia and from territory to be ceded to Yugoslavia. Mr. Jebb (U.K.) pointed out that two parts of this latter amendment were covered by Annex 3 and Article 65 of the treaty and that the remaining parts were too loosely drawn to be acceptable. At Mr. Jebb’s suggestion a subcommittee of three members, Belgium, France and Yugoslavia, was established to redraft the amendment in a more restrictive sense and to receive a list of looted objects from the Yugoslav Delegation. Subject to the reports of the two subcommissions, Article 11 was accepted by the Commission.

The representative of Greece introduced and spoke in favor of a new Greek amendment to Article 12 listing by name the various islands in the Dodecanese group. The representative of the Ukraine spoke in support of his delegation’s amendment to this article (CP(Gen)Doc 1 R 1). At the suggestion of M. Vyshinsky, and amended by Mr. Jebb, the Ukranian amendment was referred to the Military Commission with the request that that Commission explain the difference between “demilitarization” and “complete demilitarization” as used in Articles 11, 12 and 42.⁶⁷ Action on that part of the Article to which the Ukraine amendment applied (second sentence of Article 12) was reserved for the report from the subcommission. The Greek amendment and the remainder of Article 12 (last paragraph) were accepted without objection.⁶⁸

66. The amendment, proposed in C.P.(IT/P) Doc. 44 Revised, provided for a new article 10 a as follows:

    “The Allied and Associated Powers have taken note of the provisions (of which the text is annexed to the present Treaty) agreed upon by the Austrian and Italian Governments on September 5, 1946, giving certain guarantees to the German speaking inhabitants of the Province of Bolzano and the neighbouring bilingual townships of the Province of Trento.”

    For text of the Austrian-Italian Agreement, see C.P.(Sec) N.S. 119, vol. iv pp. 808, 810.

67. Regarding the consideration of this request and the interpretation rendered, see the United States Delegation Journal account of the 31st Meeting of the Military Commission, October 1, and footnote 34, p. 613.
68. The Soviet Union reserved the right to reopen the subject (CFM Files: Record of Decisions).