Treaty of London

Pact restoring Russian access to the Black Sea.

Articles XI - XIII of the 1856 Peace of Paris restricted Russian access to the Turkish Straits and forced a demilitarization of the Black Sea. Czar Alexander II (1855 - 1881) never accepted this defeat of Russian interests, and in 1870, he finally found an opportunity to amend the galling Black Sea clauses. With the French faring badly in the Franco-Prussian War, in October 1870 Alexander instructed his foreign minister, Prince Aleksandr Gorchakov, to announce that Russia no longer wished to abide by Articles XI - XIII. The French agreed to an international conference to discuss the proposed Russian revision. The conference opened in London in January 1871, and an agreement was reached by March. The Treaty of London annulled the Black Sea naval rearmament. However, in compensation, the sultan of the Ottoman Empire was given greater latitude to close the straits in times of war.

Bibliography

Anderson, M. S. The Eastern Question, 1774 - 1923: A Study inInternational Relations. London: Macmillan, and New York: St. Martin's, 1966.

Hurewitz, J. C., ed. The Middle East and North Africa in WorldPolitics: A Documentary Record, 2nd edition. 2 vols. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1975 - 1979.

— ZACHARY KARABELL