611.6831/138

The Minister in Greece (MacVeagh) to the Secretary of State

No. 209

Sir: I have the honor to report that pursuant to an appeal which I recently made to him on the basis of public policy and the undesirability of discrimination in Greek purchases from abroad, Mr. Maximos, the Hellenic Minister for Foreign Affairs, today informed me that he had talked with Mr. Pesmazoglou, the Minister of National Economy, and that as a result he expected that the Neptune Water Meter Company, which had submitted the low bid for supplying water meters to the Municipality of Athens, would secure a substantial part of the award now pending in spite of the fact that the competing companies, being German, are prepared to comply with the terms of barter necessitated by the present compensation policy of the Greek Government and sanctified by treaty with Germany and other countries, excluding the United States.

In this connection, I venture to remark that it appears to be the intention of the Foreign Minister to curb the tendency of the Minister of National Economy to over-emphasize his barter policy. He told me that he does not want to see barter agreements concluded with either England or America and that the general policy of Mr. Pesmazoglou to favor countries enjoying barter agreements with Greece should not be allowed to prevent the latter from buying in markets which present obvious advantages. He has asked me to bring to his attention further instances of discrimination which may be disadvantageous to Greece, and thus we seem to have opened a road for the handling of individual complaints without the Legation’s appearing as the advocate of anything more than a general principle.

Respectfully yours,

Lincoln MacVeagh