His Majesty’s Government have had under urgent consideration the situation created by the Persian Government’s announcement that the British staff of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company would be given one week from Sept. 27 to leave Persia.

Since the issue by the International Court of Justice at The Hague on July 5 of an Order enjoining on the British and Persian Governments to permit the operations of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company to be carried on as they were carried on prior to May 1, 1951, His Majesty’s Government have done everything in their power to ensure the implementation of the Court’s findings, and the Company has continued to maintain in Persia as many of its staff as were required to carry out such work as was not prevented by the actions of the Persian authorities.

The Persian Government, on the other hand, have by seizures of the Company’s property and by interference in all branches of the industry, and by subjecting the Company’s staff to increasing provocation obliged the Company to reduce its activities to a position where it could virtually do no more than maintain its installations. This has been done despite the fact that His Majesty’s Government have given every proof of their anxiety to reach a fair and reasonable settlement.

The order of expulsion now issued by the Persian Government against the remaining British staff constitutes a final flouting of the findings of the International Court. This Court is the principal judicial organ of the United Nations, of which Persia is a member.

His Majesty’s Government consider that it cannot be permitted that one party to a matter laid before it should be allowed openly to defy the Court’s findings and seek to impose its own will. Such a procedure would only result in the substitution of the rule of force for the rule of international law, on which the whole structure of the United Nations is based.

Moreover, the inaction of the order of the Persian Government in arbitrarily ordering the expulsion of some 350 British the technicians contrary to national usage, and has created a elementary principles of inter situation which might well be thought to justify the use the British force in order to preserve rights and interests involved.

His Majesty’s Government would, however, might be reluctant have to take the any effect of weakening the authority action which of the United Nations, on whose principles their policy is based. They have, therefore, decided that the right course in present circumstances is to bring the situation urgently before the Security Council, which is the appropriate body to deal with matters likely to endanger the maintenance of international peace and security and to which the provisional measures indicated by the International Court have been notified.

Arrangements are accordingly being made to summon a meeting of the Security Council as soon as possible, at which His Majesty’s Government will request the Council to call upon the Persian Government to comply in all respects with the Order of the International Court and in particular to permit the continued residence at Abadan of the staff affected by the expulsion orders.

In the meantime His Majesty’s Government wish to make it clear that they regard the products of the oil industry in South Persia as remaining the property of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and that it proposed to take all practicable steps to prevent any attempt on the part of the Persian Government to dispose of this oil in any manner to third parties.