Letter from the French Consul in Cyprus to the Minister of Foreign Affairs on the mission's creditsConsul de France à Chypre

CONSULATE of FRANCE to the ISLANDS of MALTA AND CYPRUS

J.L.McA./J.R.A. 22 - 8 - 47

AE 200 CO

Ref: your 68 CO The Consul of France in the Islands of Malta and Cyprus,

to HIS EXCELLENCY Mr THE MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Re: Schaeffer Mission in Cyprus.

Ref: letter of 12 January 47 from the Secretary General of the Commission of Excavations, to the Consul of France in Malta, Gozo and Cyprus.

I have the honour to inform Your Excellency that the 956 Cypriot pounds 13 shillings and 4 piastres transferred to Nicosia in Cyprus to the account of Mr Claude Schaeffer, archaeologist, for his excavations of 1946 and 1947, correspond to a subsidy fully granted in 1947 by the Department and which forms the subject of my accounts for the month of January 1947 (AE 22 CO) payment order Model 18, the money having been sent by me to Cyprus, to Nicosia in January 47 at the disposal of our consular agent in Cyprus Mr Jules Lapierre, to be handed to Mr C. Schaeffer when he came to Cyprus.

Now, he having come to Cyprus in 1946, has not come to the island of Paphos this year and I have mentioned a word to Your Excellency in the department of Cultural Relations. The department concerned having nevertheless decided that the operation was perfectly regular and that, in agreement with the Finance department, the funds could be, even in the absence of the beneficiary, handed to his account at Barclays Bank in Famagusta, where he does not reside. This is what was done by my office.

It is therefore only a payment already accepted in principle, for which the payment order was already carried out at the time, and that only the transfer from an account in Nicosia where the sum was deposited in the personal account in Famagusta of our consular agent pending direct contact with Mr Schaeffer, absent from Cyprus up to this day. Mr Schaeffer's receipts should be requested from the Cultural Relations department in Paris, where our archaeologist does not seem to have moved.

Although Mr Schaeffer is an extremely serious man, the generalisation of the system of grants sent at a distance to people who are not on the spot, would prove dangerous and fraught with consequences.

Please believe, Excellency, in the assurance of my very high consideration.

Handwritten: J.L. McAg...tes

No. 947 Gen.