RTC 4.0.4 zOS using curl to connect to repository - why and I getting an "unexpected message" error?

We have a 4.0.4 RTC server running under tomcat on an HP Windows 7platform  and have zOS parts installed on a zOS host (1.13). Using curl to connect to exploit oslc interface and getting "unexpected message" error. We believe it is probably due to the "certificate" warning message that we see when connecting via a web browser. We don't want to revert to using HTTP so is there a way using curl to get around the error?

Here is the command we are executing:

 HOST="https://hostxxx:9443/ccm"                     
 CMD=/u/userxx/curl/bin/curl                   
                                                            
 $CMD -k -L -c $COOKIES "$HOST/authenticated/identity" -v -S

Here is the error:

* IDN support not present, can't parse Unicode domains                         
* About to connect() to 70.36.195.151 port 9443 (#0)                           
*   Trying 70.36.195.151...                                                    
* connected                                                                    
* Connected to 70.36.195.151 (70.36.195.151) port 9443 (#0)                    
* SSLv3, TLS handshake, Client hello (1):                                      
* SSLv3, TLS handshake, Server hello (2):                                      
* SSLv3, TLS handshake, CERT (11):                                             
* SSLv3, TLS handshake, Server key exchange (12):                              
* SSLv3, TLS handshake, Server finished (14):                                  
                                                                               
* SSLv3, TLS handshake, Client key exchange (16):                              
* SSLv3, TLS change cipher, Client hello (1):                                  
* SSLv3, TLS handshake, Finished (20):                                         
* SSLv3, TLS alert, Server hello (2):                                          
* error:140943F2:SSL routines:SSL3_READ_BYTES:sslv3 alert unexpected message   
* Closing connection #0                                                        
curl: (35) error:140943F2:SSL routines:SSL3_READ_BYTES:sslv3 alert unexpected me
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