PEACE PLAN DEAD

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 3000, 19 December 1935, Page 7

PEACE PLAN DEAD

GENEVA ADMISSIONS. Britain Does Not Wish to Pursue It Further. ITALY LEAVES COUNCIL. United Press Association. —Copyright. (Received 11.30 a.m.) LONDON, December 18. The speeches of Mr. Anthony Eden and M. Laval at Geneva are regarded as admissions that the peace plan is dead. Mr. Eden said that if either Italy or Abyssinia, or the League rejects the plan Britain Avould not wish to pursue it further. In early statements of the British position, Mr. Eden indicated that there was no intention that the peace proposals should be imposed on the League. If they were rejected, the League Council must take the next step, as Britain was not anxious to make another effort without more definite indication of tlie lines of settlement acceptable to the League. Meanwhile, it is assumed the next step will be the extension of economic pressure on Italy, in which Britain is still prepared to share collective action. The Ethiopian delegate handed to the League Secretariat a long Note showing that the Hoare-Laval terms were impossible from the viewpoint of Ethiopia. The Council met privately in an atmosphere of suppressed excitement. It waited 15 minutes while the Italian delegate sought instructions from Rome whether to sit at the table. As none arrived he withdrew. The Council then merely adopted the report of a committee recommending the settlement of Assyrian refugees in Syria.

EMPEROR FIRM. League Challenged on Action Taken. PRINCIPLES VIOLATED. (Received 1 p.m.) GENEVA, December 18. The Abyssinian Note in reply to the peace proposals is published to-day, and will be handed to the British and French Ambassadors at Addis Ababa to-mor-row. It must not be regarded as a reply to the Franco-British suggestions. This will be sent later. Roman circles refuse to forecast Italy's reply pending the result of the meeting of the Fascist Grand Council late to-night. The Abyssinian Note challenges the League's authorisation of anyone to prepare proposals and forward them to parties to the dispute, and asks whether the Council did not reserve to itself the mediatory role. It implores that the-League should abide by the principle laid down by M. Herriot's recent speech that justice is the sole foundation of peace, and believes the League will refuse to admit the Paris suggestions, which violate the principles of the Covenant. It also points out that even the most powerful member of the League is hot exempt from the danger of attack if any other decision is reached. Haile Silassie will tell the League his decision only after the League has pronounced upon the Franco-British proposals.,