June 19, 1950
MEMORANDUM OF CONVERSATION
Participants: The Secretary ARA - Mr. Miller MID - Mr. Bennett with the following Ambassadors: Ambassador Sevilla-Sacasa of Nicaragua Ambassador Castro of El Salvador Ambassador Thomen of the Dominican Republic Ambassador Nabuco of Brazil Ambassador de la Colina of Mexico Ambassador Berckemayer of Peru Ambassador Valle of Honduras Ambassador Pocaterra of Venezuela Ambassador Zuleta Angel of Columbia Ambassador Goubaud-Carrera of Guatemala Ambassador Echandi of Costa Rica Señor Joaquin E. Meyer, Chargé d'Affaires of Cuba Señor Colimon, Chargé d'Affaires of Haiti Señor Moscoso, Chargé d'Affaires of Ecuador
Subject: Presentation of Notes Motivated by Coffee Report Issued by the Senate Subcommittee on Agriculture and Forestry.
Copies to: S/S, NWC, EC, ARA-Ambassador Nufer, ARA-Ambassador Daniels, AR-Mr. Dreir, ARA/P, ARA/E, ARA-Miss Grant, MID-Mr. Cale, MID, All American embassies of each country listed above.
Ambassador Sevilla-Sacasa, acting as spokesman for the fourteen chiefs of mission, spoke briefly of the preoccupation which had been caused throughout the coffee-producing countries on Latin America by the charges contained in the report on coffee recently issued by a Subcommittee of the Senate committee on Agriculture and Forestry. He said that the Governments and peoples of the fourteen countries represented at the meeting were deeply concerned over the implications of manipulations and malpractices on the part of the coffee-producing countries to force an unwarranted rise in the price of coffee in the United States market. He stated that he and his colleagues had consulted together and had decided to present a joint note to the Department to make known their preoccupation with the situation and concluded with an expression of hope that there would be no change in the policies of mutual cooperation among the countries of this Hemisphere which have served all of us so well. Ambassador Sevilla-Sacasa then handed me a note signed by himself and ten of his colleagues. The Mexican Ambassador and the Cuban Chargé d'Affaires handed me individual notes and the Venezuelan Ambassador stated that he had already addressed a note to the Department on the same subject. In reply, I expressed to the chiefs of mission my readiness to receive them at any time when they have some problem which concerns them. I remarked that I had had occasion over the week end to study briefly the Gillette report, and that I was also familiar with some of the points which were causing them concern. I assured them that Mr. Miller and I would study their note most carefully. I told them that we were discussing the report with both the Subcommittee and the full committee of the Senate and that I was confident that a solution will be found to the problem.
ARA:MID:WTBennett:dg