500.A14/771
The Minister in Persia (Hornibrook) to the Secretary of State
[Received April 17.]
Sir: I have the honor to refer to the action of the United States Senate in eliminating the King reservation5 from the Arms Traffic Convention of 1925 and to report as follows:
On March 15th, Mr. Kazemi, Minister for Foreign Affairs, approached me at the Prime Minister’s annual dinner and conveyed the information that the King reservation to the Arms Traffic Convention had been eliminated at the request of the President and that a second reservation to the effect that the convention would not become operative until the same had been ratified by all other nations which were a party thereto, had been passed by the Senate.6 He advised me that this information came by cable from the Persian Minister in Washington and asked if I had received any information on the same subject from the Department of State. I informed him that I had received no cable information, but that during his absence from Teheran I had complied with the request of Mr. Motamedi, Acting Chief of the Third Political Division handling American and European Affairs, and transmitted to Washington the request of the Imperial Iranian Government that some commitment should be made to the effect that the American Government had no disposition to interfere with any rights or claims which his government may have in the [Page 455] Gulf. I advised the Foreign Minister that I had received no reply to such communication or any intimation from my government as to what action, if any, would be taken thereon.
That the Minister was deeply disappointed in the action of the Senate in eliminating the King amendment was quite apparent, although he did not so express himself and I thought it the part of prudence to refrain from entering into any discussion of the merits of the provisions of the same or the action of the Senate in reversing itself on a question which appeared to be of such vital interest to the Persian Government. In reply to a question as to whether or not it was my opinion that the new reservation would defeat the object of the Arms Traffic Convention, I stated that while I had received no official information on that subject that I was personally inclined to be rather dubious as to whether or not all of the nations which are a party to the convention would ratify the same.
In connection with the activities of the Persian Minister to Washington in obtaining Senate approval of the original King reservation I might add that during the past few weeks there have been rather definite rumors to the effect that Djalal will be recalled after the completion of the festivities in connection with the celebration of the Persian New Year.
Respectfully yours,