HC Deb 15 December 1947 vol 445 cc1439-40
15. Mr. Driberg

asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will make a statement on the breaking-off by Yugoslavia of the Anglo-Yugoslav agreement on the repatriation of displaced persons.

Mr. Mayhew

Yes, Sir. On 10th December His Majesty's Government received a Note from the Yugoslav Ambassador stating that his Government considered the agreement on the repatriation of displaced persons, which was signed on 8th September, to be invalid, on the grounds that His Majesty's Government were making no effort to fulfil its terms. This news was at the same time released to the Press.

His Majesty's Government are surprised that the Yugoslav Government should have denounced the Bled Agreement in this way after so short a period of trial, and without discussing the matter with us beforehand. We gave full facilities to Yugoslav repatriation missions, and a special liaison team has gone to Austria to try and persuade Yugoslav displaced persons to return voluntarily. We gave these teams the same facilities as the Polish teams in Germany and Austria, who succeeded in getting some 50,000 volunteers to go back. The fact that the Yugoslav teams were meeting with much less success cannot be laid at our door.

The Yugoslav Note also complains that we have failed to hand over collaborators under the terms of the Agreement. Many of the men whose names were submitted to us by the Yugoslav Government are not in British-controlled territory; but we have held for questioning those in British-controlled territory whom we have so far managed to trace. As those against whom we find that there is a prima facie case of collaboration with the enemy are turned over to the Yugoslav authorities the House will appreciate that we cannot take hasty decisions based on insufficient evidence on matters which may involve life and death.

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