Private property of enemies lost its absolute inviolability when at the end of World War I it was subjected to the claims of Allied nationals against Germany. After World War II enemy exterior assets became the object of reparations at the Potsdam Conference between the Governments of the United States, the Union of Soviet Socialist Eepublics, and the United Kingdom. To implement the Potsdam Agreement the Allied Control Council for Germany on October 30, 1945, enacted Law No. 5 which, inter alia, purported to vest in the Council title to German private assets in the neutral countries. In Switzerland this action eventually culminated in the Swiss-Allied Accord of May 25,1946, between France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Switzerland, which provided for the liquidation of German property in Switzerland4 valued at approximately 150 million dollars. The proceeds of liquidation are to go fifty percent to Switzerland and fifty percent to the several governments signatory to the Paris Reparations Agreement of December 21, 1945.

If the twenty-sixth year of the World Court has not been one of intense activity, it has been marked by events of some significance for the future. The single session held by the Court during the year was devoted to administrative questions, largely to those growing out of the reorganization of the previous year. One proceeding was instituted before the Court, the first since its reorganization, and the Court was seized of one request for an advisory opinion emanating from the General Assembly. Some progresswas made in the extension of the Court’s jurisdiction, and a series of resolutions concerning the Court was adopted by the General Assembly on November 14, 1947.

A congressional inquiry to the Department of State concerned the practice of signing documents such as the Trilateral Statement concluded at Moscow on January 14, 1994, by President William J. Clinton, Russian Federation President Boris Yeltsin, and Ukraine President Leonid M. Kravchuk and the status of such documents under both United States and international law and practice.