TINY REPUBLIC.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 53, Issue 285, 13 September 1933, Page 8

TINY REPUBLIC.

TROUBLES! OF ANDORRA. « APPEAL TO THE LEAGUE. LONDON, August 31. Trouble looms again in Europe, unless the League of Nations listens to the plea of Andorra, the tiny rockbound republic that has clung to its independence, and the southern slopes of the Pyrenees, since 790, says a message from Barcelona. The Council-General of the Republic, composed of 24 Illustrious Men, elected, four to each of the six provinces, by the heads of the nation's families, has met secretly in Barcelona. The Illustrious Men, presided over by' their Syndic, who is elected for life, would have met in their own capital, but the French police prohibited the meeting. That action is the cause of the storm.

So the council of this nation, the chief industry of which is smuggling wax matches and tobacco, has appealed to Geneva. The Wire Men of the mountaineers of Andorra declare solemnly that the •'French invasion is a breach of the Kellogg Pact." Therefore they ask the League to intervene.

The patience of Andorrean diplomacy which for centuries has wavered between the goodwill of France and Spain, the two border nations which import most of the country's 400-per-cent-profit contraband, may reach breaking-point, and 600 hardy shepherd mountaineers may climb from their rocky fastnesses and descend on Paris.