Britain’s official policy holds that the Suez Canal must be operated as “an international waterway,” in conformity with an agreement made at the United Nations in 1956, when Egypt agreed to permit “free and open transit, without overt or covert” discrimination against any user of the international waterway.
This policy was confirmed by the Government today in a statement made to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency by the spokesman for the Foreign Office in connection with Israel’s complaint yesterday to the United Nations against Egypt’s interference with Israeli shipping through the Suez Canal.
The spokesman declared that the Government’s policy remains the same as enunciated some time ago in the House of Commons by Commander Alan Noble, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs. In that statement, Commander Noble declared that the Government’s policy is that the Canal must be operated as an international waterway in conformance with the “six principles” laid down at the United Nations.
Two of those six principles, to which Egypt agreed in 1956 and which the U.N. Security Council confirmed in a resolution adopted October 13, 1956, provide that: “The Canal must be open to transit without discrimination, overt or covert, both political and technical,” and that operation of the Canal must be “insulated from the policies of any country.”
Throughout the day today, officials of the Israeli Embassy, headed by Charge d’Affaires Arthur A. Liveran, have been in touch with the British Foreign Office. Hopes were expressed that Britain will now take a positive stand for the maintenance of the principles of free navigation through the Canal.
It is understood that the Foreign Office is studying another aspect of the latest United Arab Republic action in which the cargoes of foreign, non-Israeli owners were taken off at Port Said because the cargoes had originated in Israel. The British Government was presumed to have a special interest in the dispute because the cargo of one ship had been destined for Ceylon, a member of the British Commonwealth. The cargo of the second ship had been acquired by buyers in the British Crown colony, Hong Kong, and in Malaya, another Commonwealth member.
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