LAST NIGHT'S NEWS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XXXIX, Issue 9516, 1 February 1919, Page 6

LAST NIGHT'S NEWS.

PEACE CONFERENCE.

SIR JOSEPH COOK HOPEFUL

LONDON, January 29. Sir Joseph Cook is not unhopeful that tho ultimate resultg of.the. Peace Conference will be satisfactory to Australia. He confesses that ke us not

enamoured of the policy of mandator-

ies in the Pacific, but ho believes that when Jinality is readied nothing untoward will be decided m far as the

Pacific is concerned. It is difficult to understand the practicability of tho mandatories policy anywhere, but particularly in' the remote Pacific, inasmuch as the mandatory Power presumably will be subject to a League'of Nations whose constitution ,is unknown, powers undefined and policy unguessable. ' Anything short of direct Control will be for Australia and' Britain a leap in tho dark. PARIS, January 30. Mr Fraser states that the oversea delegates believe that President Wilson's firm s,tand is due to fear that Japanese occupation of islands in tin.' Pacific may cause an outcry in America. President Wilson declares that his 14 points accepted by the Allies included the principle- of no annexation. President Wilson says-:—"If the Conference tolerates acquisitions we shall renew the evil atmosphere of the Vienna, Congress." Grave difficulties are foreseen in putting.a compromise into operation, seeing that conquered territory may theoretically be annexed, subject to the will of the League. The question, therefore, arises who pays a Government -for development of a conquered area, also whether the mandatory Power shall be allowed to exclude such people as it wishes. French and Italian and British overseas opinion concurs in regarding international control as doomed to failure.