The Corfu Channel incident consists of three separate events involving Royal Navy ships in the Channel of Corfu which took place in 1946, and it is considered an early episode of the Cold War.Times Online Obituary: Lieutenant-Commander Hugh Knollys Navigator who won a DSC on D-Day and survived when his destroyer hit a mine in the postwar Corfu Channel incident.Waibel, Michael, (2012) ‘Corfu Channel Case’ in Rüdiger Wolfrum (ed), Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law, vol III (Oxford University Press 2012), https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1919599 During the first incident, Royal Navy ships came under fire from Albanian fortifications. The second incident involved Royal Navy ships striking mines; and the third occurred when the Royal Navy conducted mine-clearing operations in the Corfu Channel, but in Albanian territorial waters, and Albania complained about them to the United Nations.
This series of incidents led to the Corfu Channel case, where the United Kingdom brought a case against the People's Republic of Albania to the International Court of Justice.JSTOR The Corfu Channel Case Quincy Wright The American Journal of International Law, Vol. 43, No. 3 (July 1949), pp. 491–494 (article consists of 4 pages) Published by: American Society of International Law Retrieved 31-07-08 The Court rendered a decision under which Albania was to pay £844,000 to the United Kingdom. This is equivalent to £ in 2015 terms. Because of the incidents, Britain in 1946 broke off talks with Albania aimed at establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries. Diplomatic relations were only restored in 1991.
History
The incidents started proper on 15 May 1946 when seven Royal Navy ships, including and , crossed the Corfu Channel following a prior inspection and clearing of the strait. While crossing, they came under fire from Albanian artillery in coastal fortifications. The shells missed and the British warships could not return fire. Although the ships suffered no material damage and no human casualties occurred, Britain issued a formal demand for "an immediate and public apology from the Albanian Government". Such apology was not forthcoming, however, and the Albanian Government claimed that the British ships had trespassed into Albanian territorial waters.Digest of International Cases on the Law of the Sea By Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea, United Nations Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea, United Nations Office of Legal Affairs Published by United Nations Publications, 2007 . 272 pages Albania issued a warning that prior notice should be given for all vessels passing through the Corfu Channel. The British government declared that it would not give prior notice and threatened that if British warships were fired on again, they would return fire.
The second incident was more serious. On 22 October 1946, a Royal Navy flotilla composed of the cruisers and HMS Leander, with accompanying destroyers, was ordered northward through the Corfu Channel with express orders to test the Albanian reaction to their right of innocent passage.Australian Journal of Legal History Half Light Between War and Peace: Herbert Vere Evatt, The Rule of International Law, and The Corfu Channel Case.Institute for International Law and Justice The crews were instructed to respond if attacked.
They were passing close to the Albanian coast in what they considered to be a mine-free zone with Mauritius leading and following closely. Leander was about one and two-thirds of a nautical mile or three kilometres away accompanied by . Near the bay of Saranda, just prior to 3 p.m., the destroyer Saumarez struck a mine and was heavily damaged.People's war on BBC Picture of the moment of impact and estimate of men lost The destroyer Volage was ordered to tow Saumarez south to a Corfu harbour.
At approximately 4:16 p.m., while towing, Volage also struck a mine and sustained heavy damage. The ship's bow was completely blown off and adverse weather conditions in the straits made the towing effort exceedingly difficult with all ships sailing stern-first,HMS Cardigan Bay Association but after twelve hours of effort all ships managed to reach the Corfu harbour. Forty-four men died and forty-two were injured in the incident.
Between thirty-two and forty-three of the dead are estimated to have belonged to the crew of Saumarez.Battleships UK Photo of HMS Saumarez after hitting a mine during the Corfu Channel Incident and estimate of men lost. Retrieved 31 July 2008 Saumarez was damaged beyond repair while the damage to Volage was repairable.The Threat of Force in International Law: the open framework The menu choice : a guide to interpretation Precedents of the International Court of Justice Deciphering post-Charter practice: means and limits Open threats to extract concessions Demonstrations of force Countervailing threats or ...By Nikolas Stürchler Published by Cambridge University Press, 2007, . 358 pages The Albanian coastal batteries did not fire during this incident and an Albanian Navy ship approached the scene flying the Albanian flag and a white flag. The mines were allegedly laid by Yugoslavian Navy minelayers Mljet and Meljine on Albanian request, around 20 October 1946. Joseph Caruana, Pole minowe! Incydent w Kanale Korfu, in: Okręty Wojenne nr. 2(30)/1999Owen Pearson.Albania as dictatorship and democracy: from isolation to the Kosovo War, p. 154.
The British Minister of Pensions at the time of the incident awarded full military pensions to the disabled and to the widows of the dead.
The third and final incident occurred on 12–13 November 1946 when the Royal Navy carried out an additional mine sweeping operation in the Corfu channel, codenamed "Operation Retail".The Law and Organisation of International Commodity Agreements By Kabir-ur-Rahman Khan Published by BRILL, 1982 . 416 pages Under the direction of the Allied Commander-in-Chief Mediterranean the minesweeping operation took place within Albanian territorial waters, but without authorisation by the Albanian government, and had the additional purpose of using the mines as corpora delicti to prove that the British were acting in self defence by attempting to clear hazards to navigation.
There was also present a French naval officer who, at the invitation of the Mediterranean Zone Board, acted as an observer. An aircraft carrier (), cruisers and other warships provided cover. Twenty-two contact mines were discovered and cut from their undersea moorings. The placement of the mines was such that the minefield was deemed to have been deliberately designed and not simply a random aggregation of isolated mines. Two of the cut mines were sent to Malta for further examination.
It was then discovered that the mines were of German origin but they were free of rust and marine growth. They were also freshly painted and their mooring cables were recently lubricated. It was concluded that the minefield was laid shortly before the incident involving Saumarez and Volage. Mine fragment analysis from Volage confirmed the mines were similar to the ones at Malta.
Following the third incident, Albania, under prime minister Enver Hoxha, dispatched a telegram to the United Nations complaining about an incursion by the Royal Navy into Albanian coastal waters.Straits Used for International Navigation: A Spanish Perspective By José Antonio de Yturriaga Published by Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1991 . 372 pages
Aftermath
On 9 December 1946 Britain sent a note to the Albanian government accusing Albania of laying the mines and demanding reparations for the May and October incidents. Britain demanded a reply within fourteen days, mentioning that in the event of an Albanian refusal to pay reparations the matter would be referred to the UN Security Council. In its reply, which was received by the British on 21 December 1946, the Albanian government denied the British allegations and went on to claim that the whole affair was the work of countries which did not wish to see a normalisation of relations between Albania and Britain; and in fact vessels from Greece and other countries had trespassed recently in the area where the mines were discovered.
The British government did not find this response satisfactory and it eventually brought its case to the International Court of Justice, having failed in its attempt to involve the Security Council in the matter. It was the first case adjudicated by the ICJ,Nations Encyclopedia Disputes Relating to the Law of the Sea and in December 1949 the court awarded the British the sum of £843,947 or US$2,009,437 having found that,"Corfu Channel" Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 24 October 2009 irrespectively of who laid the mines, the Albanians ought to have observed any such action, since the minefield was so close to their coast, and thus they failed to inform the British of the danger.Fjalori Enciklopedik Shqiptar. (1985); page 399. The Court also rejected the self-defence argument advanced by the United Kingdom and found that the mine-clearing operations undertaken by the Royal Navy during Operation Retail, in the absence of prior consent from the Albanian government, were illegal.
The Albanian government refused to pay the reparations ordered by the Court and in retaliation the British government withheld 1,574 kilograms of Albanian gold from entering the country. The gold, looted by the Axis powers from Albania during World War II, was stored in the vaults of the Bank of England and was awarded to the Albanians by the US-UK-France tripartite commission in 1948 after it was retrieved by the Allies.
With the end of the Cold War, the People's Socialist Republic of Albania ceased to exist in 1992. Diplomatic relations between the two countries were established on 29 May 1991.UK in Albania (British Embassy in Albania) Soon after, on 8 May 1992, Britain and Albania announced that they had come to an agreement over the Corfu Channel case, jointly announcing that "Both sides expressed their regret at the Corfu Channel Incident of 22 October 1946". Only in 1996 following lengthy negotiations was the gold finally returned to Albania after it agreed to pay US$2,000,000 in delayed reparations.
Enver Hoxha, in his memoirs about his first meeting with Joseph Stalin, claimed that the whole affair was concocted by the British as an excuse to conduct naval patrols near Saranda. Hoxha also wrote that "We have never planted mines in the Ionian Sea. The mines that exploded had either been laid by the Germans in the time of war, or were deliberately laid by the British, later, so that they could explode them". He also criticised the presence of the Royal Navy in the region, writing that "There was no reason for these ships to be sailing along our coast, they had not notified us about such a movement."Enver Hoxha: Memoirs from my Meetings with Stalin – "First Meeting (July 1947)" Marxists.org. Retrieved 10 July 2023. Hoxha also described the events as "an unprecedented provocation toward our country".