C Explanatory
Memorandum
1. On 11th and 12th September
the Committee on General Affairs proceeded to an examination of
the Report on the future position of the Saar submitted to it by
the Rapporteur, M. van der Goes van Naters.
2. Although your Committee has not as yet completed its examination
of the Report, it is, nevertheless, in a position to submit a draft
Recommendation to the Assembly containing constructive proposals.
3. At the recent session of the Committee not all members were
in a position to submit considered amendments to the draft Resolution
with which the Report concludes. This fact reflects at once the
complexity and difficulty of the subject-matter of the Report, especially
in its economic aspects, and is evidence of the desire of the Committee
that all points of view should be fully considered before any final
decision is taken on so important a matter.
4. Your Committee will therefore keep the consideration of the
Report on its Agenda, and submit the final text for consideration
by the Assembly as soon as possible.
5. The terms of the Draft Recommendation call for some explanation.
6. Since the Rapporteur submitted the Report on the future position
of the Saar, two major political developments have taken place.
The first of these was the result of the West iserman election of 6th September;
the second is the possibility that bilateral negotiations between
France and Germany over the Saar will be resumed in the near future.
This latter development must be especially welcomed. It has become patent
that the Saar problem must be settled rapidly, unless the whole
work of building a United Europe is to be halted. It is not only
the ratification of the E. C. D., which is at stake, but also a
test of the confidence of the European partners in each other. Meanwhile,
behind all the considerations of political expediency and the ratification
of Treaties, is the voice of the ordinary man and woman in the Saar,
who have known four changes of régime in 35 years, and who appeal
to their fellow-Europeans to grant them such peace as this world
can give.
7. If the Franco-German negotiations lead to a solution, then
all good Europeans will accept it willingly. At the same time, the
Assembly has a duty to express the European view of the question.
8. In particular, the European interest demands that what must
be sought is not a temporary, but a permanent, solution. When a
just solution has been found, it must remain.
9. In order to ensure this permanency, the agreed solution should
be considered at a Conference of the kind envisaged in the draft
Recommendation – and guaranteed by those Great Powers most closely concerned.
10. This, therefore, is the significance of the Conference proposed
in the draft Recommendation. If the bilateral negotiations succeed,
it will be, as it were, a "ratification" Conference, setting the
European seal on a European solution achieved by France and Germany.
If, however, France, Germany and the Saar feel it would be easier
to reach agreement in a wider framework, then the Conference itself
would work out a solution to the problem. In this latter case, many
details would have to be agreed concerning the functioning of the
Conference in practice; but the essential point is to emphasise
the flexibility of the concept itself of such a Conference. The Committee
has deliberately left it open to the march of events to decide which
of the two methods is adopted by the Conference. It will at the
same time be noted, however, that a reason able time-scale has
also been laid down.
11. These are the reasons that have led your Rapporteur to propose
the holding of such a Conference.
12. The sense of paragraph 4 of the Draft Recommendation and of
the Draft Order of the Assembly is that the Committee on General
Affairs will pursue its study of the Report on the future position
of the Saar as soon as all members of the Committee are in a position
to submit amendments thereto. This will mean that the Committee
will pursue its work both before and during the negotiations on
the governmental level envisaged between France and Germany. Thereafter,
in order that the final text of the Report be considered by the Conference
(which, if the Recommendation is adopted by the Committee of Ministers,
will be held in the first months of 1954), it will be necessary
either to hold an Ordinary or Extra ordinary Session of the Assembly
to consider it, or to instruct the Committee of General Affairs
to transmit the text, as finally agreed in Committee, directly to
the Conference, on behalf of the Assembly. The decision, either
as to the date of the Ordinary or Extraordinary Session or as to
the transmission of the Report adopted by the Committee on General
Affairs, will be one for the Standing Committee to take.
13. The draft Recommendation was adopted in Committee by 21 votes
to nil, with 2 abstentions. The Draft Order of the Assembly was
adopted unanimously.
