There is no right way to play. Obviously it's a personal issue how one wishes to treat neutrals but to advocate for the status quo, that is a renown loss for sinking non-belligerents, consider this:
Even towards the end of the war the Reich Foriegn Office was trying very hard to keep additions from the list of Germany's enemies. Sinking neutral shipping was no help in this at all and indeed, attacks on neutrals frequently resulted in the victim's country taking some sort of diplomatic action against Germany over the long run or in a manner not to Germany's advantage. Spain's Franco certainly exploited the loss of Spanish ships to U-Boats to the Nazi's detriment as did Portugal, Brazil and before December 10 1941, the biggest neutral of them all, the USA.
So if the flotilla commander or even BdU signed off on sinking a neutral ship, it is unlikely you would be making many friends in high places.
In the late war one seldom has the luxury to actually identify the nationality of the target. If I get home and learn that I sank a Swede or Mexican, I have no issue with taking the renown hit imposed by GWX3.
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