adopted “concerning religious communities”, replacing that of 1923. Under Article 24 of this law, which came into force on February 1st, 1931, “religious communities and their sects may open religious schools and seminaries for the education of their ecclesiastical personnel, so long as they conform to the laws of the State and to the statutes and rules of the community as approved by the State”. On November 14th, 1930, a circular of the Minister of Public Education was published, abolishing religious instruction in schools. Finally, in 1933, the Albanian National Assembly modified Articles 206 and 207 of the Constitution of 1928, and those Articles now run as follows: “The instruction and education of Albanian subjects are reserved to the State and will be given in State schools. Primary education is compulsory for all Albanian nationals and will be given free of charge. Private schools of all categories at present in operation will be closed [FN1].” -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------[FN1] This translation is taken from the Council Resolution of January 18th, 1935. The following translation appears in the report adopted by the Council on January 14th, 1935: “The teaching and education of Albanian subjects are reserved to the [14] State, which shall be responsible for giving such teaching and education in its schools. Elementary education is compulsory for all Albanian nationals and shall be given free of charge. Private schools of all categories at present in existence shall be closed.” -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------[p14] [33] Thus the abolition of private schools in Albania was completed. [34] Following upon these measures, a number of petitions which have not been produced to the Court seem to have been addressed to the League of Nations, relating mainly to the question of the abolition of private schools in Albania. The Committee of the Council which had been instructed to examine these petitions requested the Secretary-General in a letter dated November 21st, 1934, to place the question of the scope of Article 5 of the Albanian Declaration of October 2nd, 1921, in regard to certain points, upon the Council agenda at the earliest possible moment. The letter contains the following passage on the subject: “This Article contains a set of interdependent provisions. In our opinion the last, which refers to advice to be given by the League of Nations, is a most important point to bear in mind in judging the present situation. As it appears that such advice has not yet been given, we think it would be well to draw the Council’s attention to this fact, so that it may decide whether it desires to take action under these clauses.” [35] The Committee of the Council, before taking this step, had been able to see, inter alia, the observations sent by the Albanian Government to the Secretary-General on July 23rd and November 3rd, 1934, the text of which has been communicated to the Court. It is stated in the report adopted on January 14th, 1935, that a comparison of the legislation in force in Albania with that of 1923 led three Members of the Council to the conclusion that the situation had changed considerably, so that they thought it desirable to draw the Council’s attention to the fact that the recommendations contemplated in Article 5, paragraph 2, of the Albanian Declaration had not yet been formulated. [36] After discussing the question on the basis of the reports presented by the Spanish representative at the meetings on January 14th and 18th, 1935, the Council decided, by a Resolution adopted on the latter date and the terms of which are reproduced above, to ask the