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The German Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Schulenburg) to the German Foreign Office
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Telegram

VERY URGENT
Moscow, October 5, 1939-12:30 a. m.
STRICTLY SECRET

No. 470 of October 4

Reference my telegram No. 463 of October 3.

Immediately after Under State Secretary Gaus' first telephone call I transmitted to Molotov this morning the request not to divulge to the Lithuanian Foreign Minister anything regarding the German-Soviet understanding concerning Lithuania. Molotov asked me to see him at 5 p. m. and told me, that, unfortunately, he had been obliged yesterday to inform the Lithuanian Foreign Minister of this understanding, since he could not, out of loyalty to us, act otherwise. The Lithuanian delegation had been extremely dismayed and sad; they had declared that the loss of this area in particular would be especially hard to bear, since many prominent leaders of the Lithuanian people came from that part of Lithuania. This morning at 8 a. m. the Lithuanian Foreign Minister had flown back to Kowno, intending to return to Moscow in one or two days.

I said that I would immediately notify my Government by telephone, whereupon I called Herr Gaus. An hour later Molotov informed me that Stalin personally requested the German Government not to insist for the moment upon the cession of the strip of Lithuanian territory.

SCHULENBURG

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