JUDGMENT No. 12.-UPPER SILESIA (MINORITY SCHOOLS) 26 the German Government, in its Reply, accepts this line of discussion and maintains that Article 69 constitutes an argument in support of its contentions. Even if one were disposed to regard the consent to the examination of the German submissions by the Court as depending on Article 69 being taken into consideration, this condition would thus have been fulfilled. Indeed, as will be shown later, the Court, when considering the merits, has itself taken up the standpoint that Article 69 must be taken into account, in conformity with the views expressed by the Polish Government in its CounterCase. Furthermore, the declarations of the Polish Government which, as has already been stated, were recorded by the Council at its meeting of March 7th, 1928, also tend to indicate the significance to be attached to the fact that the Polish Government, in its Counter-Case, has replied on the merits of the suit without making any reservations. The Court, therefore, arrives at the conclusion that the Polish Government has implicitly accepted the jurisdiction of the Court to give judgment on the merits in respect of all the claims of the German Government and that the objection to the jurisdiction made in the Rejoinder cannot invalidate the acceptance which existed at the time of the submission of the Counter-Case. Moreover, even if this were not the case, the argument against the Court's jurisdiction, which is based on Article 72, paragraph 3, could have no bearing on the third contention of the German Government, in so far as that contention is based on Articles 65 and 68 of the Convention, which articles are amongst those contemplated in Article 72, paragraph 3. The Court, having established that i t is competent in virtue of the acceptance of its jurisdiction by the Respondent, need not consider whether, and to what extent, the first two contentions of the German Government's submission would also fa11 within the scope of the jurisdiction conferred upon it by Article 72, paragraph 3, of the Geneva Convention. Nevertheless, as the German Government has expressed the opinion that the Court's jurisdiction covers disputes concerning the stipulations of Division II of Part III of the Convention, and therefore also the articles cited by it in