Litvinov's Pact

Litvinov's Pact was concluded on February 9, 1929 in Moscow. It is named after the best-known and most successful Soviet diplomat who organized the negotiations, Maxim Litvinov. It provided for renunciation of war among its signatories according to the principles of the Kellogg–Briand Pact.

It was ratified by the government of Latvia on March 5, 1929, by Estonia on March 16, 1929, and the governments of Poland and Romania on March 30, 1929. It was registered in League of Nations Treaty Series on June 3, 1929.^[1] According to article 3, it became operative on March 16, 1929.

Background

The Union Government communicated to the Government of the Polish Republic a draft of a non-aggression treaty. The Union Government was obligated to observe that even if negotiation for the conclusion of a treaty were begun with the Polish Government some years before, they had not made any progress. Since the Soviet Government observed that the Kellogg pact imposed on its signatories peaceful obligations, it adhered to the pact and it wanted to see the treaty enter into force as quickly as possible, but the entry into force of the Paris treaty depended on its ratification by the fourteen States. Since four months after the treaty was signed, not one of the fourteen States ratified it, the only way by they could run the treaty was to sign a supplementary instrument. Once Poland signed the Pact of Paris (the Kellogg-Briand Pact), the Soviet Government decided to propose to the Polish Government the conclusive part of the attached protocol, under which the Pact of Paris for the renunciation of the war would enter into force between the Soviet Union and Poland after its ratification. In making this proposal the Soviet Government was not withdrawing its first proposal to the Polish Government for a non-aggression pact, the conclusion by which in the future there would have been a good neighborly relation between USSR and Polish Republic. The Soviet Government contacted also the Lithuanian Government, as the only Baltic country that signed the Paris treaty, in the case that Finland, Estonia or Latvia signed the same offer was to be made.^[2] It was signed by the Soviet Union, Poland, Romania, Latvia and Estonia, in which those countries promised not to use force to settle their disputes and it was considered as an 'Eastern Kellogg-Briand Pact'. In 1930 Joseph Stalin appointed Litvinov as Minister of Foreign Affairs. He was a believer in collective security, so he worked very hard in order to form a closer relationship with France and Britain.

References

External links

• Text of the treaty