Article 439.
Without prejudice to the provisions of the present Treaty, Germany undertakes not to put forward directly or indirectly against any Allied or Associated Power, signatory of the present Treaty, including those which without having declared war, have broken off diplomatic relations with the German Empire, any pecuniary claim based on events which occurred at any time before the coming into force of the present Treaty.
The present stipulation will bar completely and finally all claims of this nature, which will be thenceforward extinguished, whoever may be the parties in interest.
Article 440.
Germany accepts and recognizes as valid and binding all decrees and orders concerning German ships and goods and all orders relating to the payment of costs made by any Prize Court of any of the Allied or Associated Powers, and undertakes not to put forward any claim arising out of such decrees or orders on behalf of any German national.
The Allied and Associated Powers reserve the right to examine in such manner as they may determine all decisions and orders of German Prize Courts, whether affecting the property rights of nationals of those Powers or of neutral Powers. Germany agrees to furnish copies of all the documents constituting the record of the cases, including the decisions and orders made, and to accept and give effect to the recommendations made after such examination of the cases.
The present Treaty, of which the French and English texts are both authentic, shall be ratified.
The deposit of ratifications shall be made at Paris as soon as possible.
Powers of which the seat of the Government is outside Europe will be entitled merely to inform the Government of the French Republic through their diplomatic representative at Paris that their ratification has been given; in that case they must transmit the instrument of ratification as soon as possible.
A first procès-verbal of the deposit of ratifications will be drawn up as soon as the Treaty has been ratified by Germany on the one hand, and by three of the Principal Allied and Associated Powers on the other hand.
From the date of this first procès-verbal the Treaty will come into force between the High Contracting Parties who have ratified it. For the determination of all periods of time provided for in the present Treaty this date will be the date of the coming into force of the Treaty.
In all other respects the Treaty will enter into force for each Power at the date of the deposit of its ratification.
The French Government will transmit to all the signatory Powers a certified copy of the procès-verbaux of the deposit of ratifications.
In faith whereof the above-named Plenipotentiaries have signed the present Treaty.
Done at Versailles, the twenty-eighth day of June, one thousand nine hundred and nineteen, in a single copy which will remain deposited in the archives of the French Republic, and of which authenticated copies will be transmitted to each of the Signatory Powers.
- (L. S.) Woodrow Wilson.
- (L. S.) Robert Lansing.
- (L. S.) Henry White.
- (L. S.) E. M. House.
- (L. S.) Tasker H. Bliss.
- (L. S.) D. Lloyd George.
- (L. S.) Ismael Monties.
- (L. S.) Calogeras.
- (L. S.)
- (L. S.) Rodrigo Ocgavio.
- (L. S.)
- (L. S.)
