The Soviet Government presented last night a note to the United States Ambassador in Moscow suggesting a Russian formula for settling the Middle East crisis, it was announced here today. The full text of the 1,500 word note was not yet available here, but a summary cabled by the U.S. Embassy in Moscow to the State Department indicates that the note reiterates previous Soviet views on the Middle East situation.
A State Department spokesman said that if the United States finds anything constructive in the Moscow note, it will be given serious consideration. The note was also presented by Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko to the British and French ambassadors in the Soviet capital. A report from Paris this afternoon quoted a spokesman for the French Foreign Office as stating “we have not fully examined the note, but already we can say that it contains absolutely nothing new.”
The new Soviet move is considered in Washington an attempt on the part of Moscow to get Western acknowledgment of Russia as a Middle Eastern power. The United States, Britain and France rejected a previous Soviet suggestion for a four-power declaration pledging the parties to refrain from force in the Middle East. The rejection was explained by the fact that the United Nations Charter already called for renunciation of force.
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