Letter to Andrei Lezhava, June 8, 1921

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Written in connection with A. M. Lezhava’s letter of June 6, 1921.

Lezhava proposed to Lenin that the following passage should be deleted from the draft telegram to A. P. Serebrovsky: “I do not at all object to Azvneshtorg [Azerbaijan People’s Commissariat for Foreign Trade] and Azneftkom [Azerbaijan Oil Committee] trading directly with Constantinople, I am prepared to support Baku’s autonomy within considerable limits, but we must have guarantees” (see this volume, Document 198). He argued that the Azerbaijan Oil Committee did not have a smoothly running trade apparatus and referred to the prepared agreement on merging the foreign trade of the three Transcaucasian republics.

Lezhava also mentioned the agreement concluded on April 22, at Rostov-on-Don, on the basis of the CLD decision of March 24, between the South-Eastern Territorial Economic Council and the French “Optorg” on the purchase of 35 million francs worth of goods at Constantinople through this company. The agreement was economically unprofitable and was not approved by the People’s Commissariat for Foreign Trade.

Urgent!

Comrade Lezhava:

Please add the word unconditionally “(I do not at all object unconditionally to Azvneshtorg trading directly with Constantinople”, etc.) and send with this addition.

Awaiting your letter. (P.S. What’s this contract I hear about involving 35 million francs in Rostov?)

With communist greetings,

Lenin