718.1915/310: Telegram
The Minister in Panama (Price) to the Secretary of State
[Received March 5—12:42 a.m.]
52. Panaman Minister for Foreign Affairs this afternoon sends a note in which he states that although the Panaman Government had not heretofore asked the intervention of the United States to expel the Costa Ricans from Coto, it had never refused to accept its aid but had invoked it in manner least onerous for the United States and most satisfactory to Panaman national sentiment, that of soliciting arms for its volunteers; that the situation has changed today; that Costa Rican Government by her repeated efforts to evict Panama from its possession of Coto on the ground that the White award had adjudged it to be their territory has now invaded the eastern side of Sixaola River adjudged by both Loubet and White awards to be Panama’s and of which Costa Rica has never had possession; that Costa Rican forces have taken Guabito and now marching on Almirante and Bocas repeating on larger scale and with aggravating circumstances [Page 181] the acts of illegal warfare committed in the region of Coto.
“The Government of Panama which has declined to remove its forces from its own territory for the sole reason of maintaining intact the good right which supports it in this contest, which has desired to maintain itself within the limits of its just defense, which has declined to take measures of coercion in Bocas del Toro so as not to affect the powerful American interests established in that region, sees with surprise, greater each day, what is occurring in the Province of Bocas del Toro and with anxiety asks itself what is to be the attitude of the Government of the United States in the presence of these last events of which Your Excellency already has perfect knowledge. Your Excellency, consider the extreme gravity of present situation and obtain from the Department of State in Washington in the quickest time possible a declaration touching the manner in which that Government understands its obligations towards Panama in these movements in the light of first article of the Hay–Bunau Varilla treaty71 inasmuch as the territorial and political integrity of our Republic is affected by acts of illegal war for which the Government of Costa Rica is responsible,”
- For text of treaty, see Foreign Relations, 1904, p. 543.↩