"My Dear Friends"

The Big Four's Foreign Ministers evacuated the Waldorf Tower in excellent order, exchanging a final round of amenities and felicitations.

Mr. Bevin: "One thing we have learned is to have patience."

M. Couve de Murville: "This is an important step in the re-establishment of world peace."

Mr. Molotov: "Permit me ... to congratulate the members of the Council of Foreign Ministers on finishing a long and hard work. ... I want to assure my colleagues that Moscow will extend a wholehearted welcome."

Mr. Byrnes: "I am very happy that we have reached agreement while we are in the city of New York and in the United States. ... I come to regard you now not as colleagues but as my dear friends."

It was agreed that the Italian, Balkan and Finnish treaties would not await the Moscow meeting (March 10) for signature, but would be signed at Paris in February by Big Four representatives. Mr. Molotov consented to allow deputies to start hearings at London in January in order to receive the views of smaller European Allies on the German and Austrian settlements.

Mr. Molotov had one final complaint to make: that U.S. press treatment of certain Soviet attitudes had been extremely "one-sided." This might have raised a certain uneasiness about Moscow's handling of foreign correspondents at the March meeting; but Mr. Molotov had previously assured Mr. Byrnes that they would be accorded the same facilities and freedom as in Manhattan. Nobody mentioned Russian coverage for the Russian people; even among dear friends some subjects are too delicate for discussion.

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