Rome radio — 2215 GMT

For the first time the Italian Administration has consulted the Territorial Council on an unusual point of international law.

The Sultan of Zanzibar claimed arrears on certain rights arising from the British-Italian Convention of 1924, when Italy undertook to pay one thousand pounds a year as part of the Sultan’s rights over the Somali Coast. The Italian Government fulfilled its obligation until September 1947 when the peace treaty ended Italian sovereignty over Italian Somaliland. Now the Sultan suddenly claimed his rights on the ground that the trusteeship mandate implies the same obligations as it had before.

The Territorial Council rejected this claim unanimously.

_{FBIS-FRB-54-069, 9 Apr. 1954, p. Q4}