Letter from General Marin Nicolsecu to Vasile Glinga

Letter from General Marin Nicolescu, Deputy Minister of the Armed Forces, to Deputy Foreign Minister Vasile Gliga, 1 June 1972.

L E T T E R

To Comrade

VASILE GLIGA

DEPUTY OF THE FOREIGN AFFAIRS MINISTER



I inform you that after the conversation I had at the Foreign Affairs Ministry on May 5 this year, I discussed – during two interviews, on May 8 and 30 this year – with Lieutenant General A.A. Dementyev, representative of the Supreme Commander of the Unified Armed Forces, the provisions in the draft document “Convention regarding the juridical capacity, the privileges, and the immunities of the general staff and of other leadership organs of the Unified Armed Forces of the states participating in the Warsaw Treaty”, in connection with which no agree-ment had been reached.

During these discussions, a number of issues were clarified, and we arrived at the formulations which – in the conversation with you on May 5 this year – we considered acceptable, and others – although they had been partly accepted – did not satisfy us and were further left in suspension, as follows:


1. Article 1, point 1

In regard to our proposal to exclude from point 1 the expression “other military cadres, as well as the civil employees” and the expression “who, during the discharging of their job attributions act as persons with international func-tions”, Lieutenant Colonel A.A. Dementyev let us know that the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces agreed only with the exclusion of the expression “other military cadres”.

[The General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces] did not agree with our proposal to exclude the second expression from point 1 and replace it with the formulation:

“From the privileges and immunities stipulated in this Convention may also benefit some civil servants working as specialists with the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces, whose functions/positions will be established periodically by the Committee of Defense Ministers of the states partici-pating in the Warsaw Treaty, in compliance with the proposal of the Su-preme Commander of the Unified Armed Forces.
The nominal list of such civil servants will be communicated by the Su-preme Commander of the Unified Armed Forces to the Defense Ministries of all of the signatory states on a yearly basis.”

Lieutenant General A.A. Dementyev insisted on maintaining the second expression, previously proposed by the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces, having the following content:

“By the term “civil servants” are to be understood only the employees working directly with the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces, in a number to be established by the Consultative Political Committee.”

Concurrently, he proposed that after the expression mentioned above, the following formulation be added:

“The lists with that part of the civil servants, who will benefit from the provisions of this Convention will be periodically communicated by the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces to the (main) general staffs of the armies of the states that are parties to the Convention.”


2. Article 2, point 2

We did not insist any more on our previous proposal that, beside the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces, the states that are parties to the Convention also can renounce the immunity of the premises/buildings, goods, assets, and documents.


3. Article 4, point 3, paragraph 2

Lieutenant General A.A. Dementyev told us that the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces agreed to the exclusion of the expression “in his opinion”.


4. Article 6, point 4

We proposed either to add the expression “and of the UN Charter” or to exclude the expression “in accordance with the provisions of the Warsaw Treaty” as well.

Lieutenant General A.A. Dementyev transmitted the proposal of the General Staff of the Unified Armed Forces that the expression should finish with “diplomatically”, to which we asked that the wording “or in any other way to be agreed upon by them” be added.

In regard to the discussions we had held, we pointed out to Lieutenant General A.A. Dementyev that, at the request of the Supreme Commander of the Unified Armed Forces, the Minister of Armed Forces of the Socialist Republic of Romania submitted the draft convention to the attention of the Foreign Affairs Ministry for finalizing and signing, and – as a result – the purpose of these interviews is to try and clarify the points of view and bring them closer together, but that the solution of issues left in suspension will be effected by the foreign affairs ministries of the states participating in the Warsaw Treaty.


DEPUTY OF THE MINISTER OF ARMED FORCES,

Colonel General

Marin Nicolescu