Its contents inform us that the Swedish negotiators prefer to have the Consular question solved in conjunction with the entire question of Foreign administration, in other words, _they plainly offered a general agreement to separate Consular services under a joint Minister of Foreign affairs_, but that the Norwegian negotiators _refused_ this offer. On the Norwegian Radical Side it was considered that the time was not yet ripe for such a solution, and a resolution in the Storthing affirmed this in January 1903, with the consent of the government; the Radicals were evidently determined not to give up their claim--so unreasonable from a Union point of view--to a separate Minister for Foreign affairs. With respect to the Consular Question, the Swedish negotiators declare that a dissolution of the joint Consular Office, appears to them, in itself, undesirable, but as an opposite opinion has long been prevalent in Norway, and as during the preliminary negotiations, it was shown to be "not impossible" that under certain circumstances a system with different Consuls for each Kingdom could be established, in order to obtain the most important advantage of the political agreement between the two countries, they have found it expedient to advise a settlement of the question on the following basis: 1. Separate Consular Services for Sweden and for Norway shall be established. The Consuls of each kingdom shall be subordinate to the authority of their own country which the latter shall have to determine. 2. The relations of the separate Consuls to the Minister for Foreign Affairs and to the Embassies shall be regulated by laws of the same wording which cannot be altered nor abolished without the consent of the authorities of both Kingdoms. It is furthermore stipulated that the Status quo with reference to the position of the Minister for Foreign affairs and the Ambassadors should remain intact. Each Kingdom is to have its right to decide on the establishment of its own Consular service; the identical laws are only to regulate the relations between the Consuls on the one side, and the Minister for Foreign affairs and diplomatic representatives on the other. The laws are especially designed to give a guarantee that the consuls do not outstep the boundaries of their occupation and at the same time secure the necessary cooperation between the Foreign Administration and the Consular Services of the two Kingdoms[24:1].