Letter, ATHENS, 22 September 1949
Your telegram No. 34 arrived too late, as the recommendations had been signed the previous day, but your instructions were pretty much what I had been following out. I did succeed in modifying some of the paragraphs, although on the whole the Committee’s mind was made up. The only thing that happened not according to plan was when China, Mexico and Brazil tried to force the Committee to include some mention of Article 51. I feel very sure that the Greeks put them up to this because it ties up with what the Greeks themselves had been saying in the press. The Greeks are looking for an excuse to enter Albania and neither the United States or the U.K. are very happy about it. This is of course the real threat to peace.
You will notice that in the first draft which was sent you on the recommendations[1], paragraph (11) contained a plan I put up earlier in the year[2] for an asylum for guerillas under the aegis of the United Nations. The Americans also brought this paragraph up before I got back from Rome. Their State Department is all for it and think it is a practical step towards resolving the war. However, the Greeks regard it as some interference with their sovereignty; but Tsaldaris told our Chinese president that he would be quite content for some Delegation to submit it at the General Assembly, but not UNSCOB.
[matter omitted]
At Rome I had lunch with a Bulgarian representative who said that if some way could be found to put off consideration of UNSCOB’s report and to concentrate instead on a practical solution, he thought that both Bulgaria and Albania would be ready to do all in their power to help in conciliation. But if on the other hand, the report is discussed and the western powers get their pound of flesh of guilt-finding, then he felt sure the Bulgarian and Albanian attitude would be to resist everything. You might keep this in mind when you are planning our line at the table.
I have told the Committee that although we have accepted the recommendations we wish to point out that we are quite free to take whatever action we wish at the General Assembly, as we did last year. Most of the delegates hope that we will bring up the old paragraph (11) for an asylum under U.N.
[matter omitted]
_[1] See Document 119.
[2] See Document 114.
_
[SFU : EVATT COLLECTION, UNITED NATIONS - BALKAN COMMISSION]