WARNING BY MR EDEN

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27374, 12 June 1954, Page 7

WARNING BY MR EDEN

Communists May

Wreck Talks

„ . GENEVA, June 10. Britain served notice on the Communists today that they would wreck the Indo-China peace conference at Geneva unless they gave up their armistice demands, which are unacceptable to the West.

This blunt warning, delivered by the British Foreign Secretary (Mr R. A. Eden), marked the beginning of the end of the nearly five-weeks-old peace talks in the view of Western circles. No Western delegate believes there is much hope of the Communists giving up their insistence on veto power within the armistice control bodies. Mr Eden’s warning that the conference could no longer shelter behind procedural expedients was a reminder that it was already working in an atmosphere of unreality. Mr Eden told the nine delegations at the peace talks today that they now had no choice but to resolve their difference “or to admit our failure.” He said he feared the last few days’ debate had deepened the differences between the East and the West (Tver a settlement on the Indo-China war.

He said the British delegation was still willing to try to resolve them, “but if the positions remain as they are today it is our clear duty to say so to the world and to admit we have failed.’’