I am directed by the Minister for External Affairs to refer to your minute (S.13983) of the 7th January, on the question of terminating the national emergency declared by the resolution passed by both Houses of the Oireachtas on the 2nd September, 1939.¹

So far as this Department is concerned, there is now no reason why the national emergency should not be declared at an end. The only context in which the question would now be of practical consequence from the point of view of this Department would be the correspondence which took place with the British in 1939 with regard to the position of the transferred officers. If the Department of Finance considers that, in view of that correspondence, the ending of the emergency should be postponed, this Department would be inclined to concur in their view.

In this Department's opinion, the ending of the emergency could not conveniently be related to the conclusion of the Peace Treaty, because the conclusion of Peace Treaties in the case of some of the recent belligerents (e.g., Germany and Japan) may lie in the very remote future.