CAB38-17 — Page 113

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APPENDIX VII.

Declaration of London--with which the sub-committee is not otherwise concerned than in so far as they relate to the special treatment due to ships encountered at sea before they are aware of the existence of a state of war.

Contraband.

26. Among the grounds on which capture is legal the foremost is the carrying of contraband, and this, as has already been suggested on a previous page of the present paper, is better treated separately, as it refers both to enemy and neutral vessels, whether in port or on the high seas.

Unneutral Service.

27. The two categories of Unneutral Service with which a neutral vessel can be charged have been explained above (§ 18). The leading feature of the provisions of the Declaration of Loudon dealing with this matter is, that vessels guilty of one of the offences specified as falling under the first category are liable to the same treatment as vessels liable to condemnation for the carriage of contraband. This part of the subject may therefore suitably be discussed in the course of the examination into the contraband question.

28. The rendering of any of the unneutral services specified under the second category of offences (article 46 of the Declaration of London; see above, § 18) exposes a neutral vessel to the treatment to which an enemy ship would be liable. It will therefore suffice here to refer generally to the prescribed manner of dealing with enemy ships encountered at sea whilst unaware of the outbreak of war, which has already been explained (see above, §§ 10 and 11).

Arrest and Removal of Passengers.

29. There is however one important point of difference, in respect, namely, to the right of arresting and detaining individual passengers. Within territorial waters, that right flows from the municipal laws of the country and its sovereign_jurisdiction, so far as it is not curtailed by conventional stipulations or the recognized rules of the law of nations. Over neutral vessels at sea under the flag of another State there is, of course, no such jurisdiction. Nevertheless, international law recognizes the right of a belligerent war-ship-a right now defined in article 47 of the Declaration of London- to seize and remove as a prisoner of war any individual embodied in the armed forces of the enemy who is found on board a neutral merchant-vessel, even though there be no ground for the capture of the vessel.”

Breach of Blockade.

30. A further ground for interfering on the high seas with neutral vessels would be their destination for a blockaded port or coast of the enemy, assuming she be at the time within the area of operations of the blockading force. Even if the vessel is aware of the outbreak of war, she cannot, under article 14 of the Declaration of London, be captured, so long as she has no knowledge of the blockade. She is not, however, entitled to proceed on her voyage after an officer of the blockading force has, in accordance with article 16 of the Declaration, entered a notification of the blockade in her logbook, and may be directed to change her course. It is to be noted that no action can be taken against a vessel in respect of an alleged attempt to break blockade except by officers of the blockading force.

VII. ILLICIT TRANSFER TO NEUTRAL FLAG.

Cases are

31. The foregoing observations refer to bonâ fide neutral vessels. however likely to arise at the very outbreak of war, in which the right of a vessel to fly a neutral flag is open to legitimate challenge. The rules governing this matter are laid down in the chapter on Transfers to a Neutral Flag, comprising articles 55 and 5ti of the Declaration of London, and it will be sufficient at this state of our enquiry to say that vessels flying a neutral flag, which there is good reason to suspect of having been transferred to such flag in violation of the conditions rendering the transfer valid under the terms of the Declaration of London, should be treated as enemy vessels.

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