124.60D/71: Telegram
The Minister in Finland (Schoenfeld) to the Secretary of State
[Received July 23—1:20 a.m.]
598. Following memorandum has been received from Foreign Office with card of Foreign Minister:
“The Minister of the United States of America, having communicated that the members of his Legation have met with difficulties from the side of the Finnish authorities when they wished to go outside Helsinki, it seems appropriate to state as follows:
The settling of some requests of the Legation for its members to proceed to forbidden localities has lately been influenced by an information from Minister Procopé that all of his and his collaborator’s corresponding demands have been declined [by the American authorities. Even his demand for a permission to go with his wife to a dinner party in the vicinity of Washington had been declined.]17
Before, e.g., during the last 2 months, only one of the requests from the Legation has not been agreed. It was question of a sailing trip within an area which ought to be considered war zone. During these 2 months the members of the Legation have received 31 permissions. The requests from the American Legation constituted, indeed 45 per cent on all the demands addressed to the Ministry by the Diplomatic Corps during this period.
However, even after the Ministry having received Minister Procopé’s communication and after Minister Schoenfeld’s discussion with the Minister for Foreign Affairs in the matter, several permits have been granted to members of the American Legation under the presumption, of course, that the treatment of similar questions in Washington be only temporary.
It may be added that several members of the Legation have been seen without permits in places where, according to the note circulaire of August 28, 1940, it is allowed to go only with a special permission. Helsinki July 18, 1942.”
- Wording in brackets added on basis of certified copy of memorandum supplied by the Finnish Foreign Office, transmitted to the Department by the Embassy in Finland in despatch No. 775 of May 26, 1959 (023.1/5–2659).↩