§ Mr. Hooleyasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if the Soviet Draft of the Treaty of Friendship has now been studied; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. George BrownWe have had to tell the Soviet Government that their Draft is not acceptable to us in its present form. When the idea was first put forward in February, 1967, it was the understanding that the Treaty was to be a framework for our bilateral relations. This would have been very useful and this was the basis on which we put some drafting proposals to the Russians last April.
The Soviet Draft is, however, mainly concerned with other matters which are not bilateral but affect directly the interests of our allies and our obligations to them.
We continue to attach importance to this proposal and we have asked the Soviet Government to take another look at the suggestions we put to them last April. I very much hope they will do so.