on  a  joint  statement  which  would  reveal  a  sufficient  identity  of  view  about  the  main
lines  of  a  „European“  settlement  for  the  Saar  to  enable  the  elections  to  be  postponed.
  In  announcing  their  failure  to  reach  agreement  the  two  Governments  stated
that  negotiations  would  be  continued.
Nevertheless  no  effort  to  resume  negotiations  has  so  far  been  made  and  it  seems
unlikely  that  any  move  will  be  made  by  either  side  for  the  time  being.  In  Germany
the  decision  to  hold  elections  has  been  received  with  regret  but  without  serious
dismay.  The  Chancellor  has  striven,  apparently  with  some  success,  to  dissociate  the
Saar  problem  from  that  of  ratification  of  the  Bonn  and  Paris  Treaties.  He  has  again
undertaken  to  raise  the  question  of  political  liberties  in  the  Saar  at  the  next  meeting
of  the  Council  of  Europe.  Meanwhile,  he  is  taking  the  line  that  it  is  for  the  French
Government  to  make  the  next  move.  His  calculation  seems  to  be  that  the  French  are
increasingly  putting  themselves  in  the  wrong  over  the  Saar  and  that  failure  to  reach
an  agreement  on  the  Saar  problem  before  the  question  of  ratification  comes  up  for
final  decision  in  the  Bundestag  in  December  will  not  necessarily  in  itself  prejudice
the  chances  of  ratification  very  seriously.
The  French  Government  are  taking  the  line  that  it  is  up  to  the  Germans  to  make  the
next  move.  According  to  an  American  report,  M.  Schuman  is  said  to  have  told  a
visitor  from  the  Saar  that  he  was  convinced  that  it  would  be  impossible  to  reach
agreement  with  the  Germans  until  after  the  German  elections  (i.e.  June  1953  at  the
earliest).  Other  French  representatives  have  been  stating  categorically  that  no
further  progress  can  be  made  until  after  the  elections  have  taken  place  in  the  Saar.
In  any  event  it  seems  evident  that  for  internal  political  reasons  the  French  Government
  are  not  in  a  position  to  make  any  further  concessions  for  the  present  in  order
to  get  an  agreement  with  the  Germans  on  the  outstanding  points  of  difference.
Points  of  Difference
The  text  is  attached  at  Annex  A  of  the  draft  Franco-German  declaration  over  which
negotiations  broke  down.  This  text  shows  the  rival  French  and  German  proposals
for  the  two  unresolved  points.  The  first  of  these  relates  to  the  question  whether,  as
the  French  desire,  it  should  be  clearly  agreed  in  advance  that  under  the  new  European
  statute  parties  advocating  any  other  solution  for  the  Saar  than  „Europeanization“
  should  still  be  banned.  The  second  deals  with  the  problem  whether,  as  the
French  wish,  it  should  be  agreed  in  advance  that  the  existing  economic  union
between  the  Saar  and  France  should  continue  in  force  and  simply  be  adapted  in  due
course  to  the  progress  of  European  integration.
Any  settlement  of  the  Saar  problem  will  clearly  have  to  take  full  account  of  these
differences.  It  is  doubtful  whether  any  solution  acceptable  to  both  sides  could  be
found  at  the  present  time.  In  the  last  resort  an  agreement  is  only  likely  to  be
achieved  as  the  result  of  further  thorough  negotiation  between  the  French  and  the
Germans  themselves.

447