As for the threatened British reprisals, the German answer was
that, if the rations of German civilian prisoners were reduced, the German authorities would not only withdraw the collective consignments, but prohibit the receipt of individual parcels. Finally, the German Government stated that they were not averse from the proposal that all British civilian prisoners in Germany should be released, but not on a basis of exact numerical exchange Lord Robert Cecil said that the Government had replied that they could not exchange the twenty-six thousand German civilian here for the four thousand British civilians in Germany. The Government would propose once more that all civilians over fifty on both sides should be repatriated, and also those over forty-five who were " unfit." It was also being proposed that the remaining British civilians and an equal number of German civilians should be interned in a neutral country. Lord Robert Cecil added that the policy of reprisals, if these should be necessary, had not it the meantime been abandoned.
