LEAGUE AGENDA

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 304, 19 September 1936, Page 11

LEAGUE AGENDA

Last-minute Addition Causes Comment SUPPLYING OF ARMS Composition of Council in Melting-pot By Telegraph—Press Assn.-— Copyright(Received September IS, 11.40 p.m.) Geneva, September 18. A large number of delegates have already assembled for the League Council meeting thia afternoon, the first In the new £1,000,000 League building. Two of the League’s most prominent - figures, Senor de Madariaga (Spain) and M. Titulescu (Rumania), will be missing, the former on account of the Spanish civil war and the latter because he has been dropped from the Rumanian Cabinet and is at present seriously ill at St Moritz, which has given rise to groundless rumours that he has been poisoned. M. Litvinov (Russia) travelled via Warsaw and Vienna to avoid crossing German territory. The Spanish Foreign Minister has arrived at Marseilles en route to Geneva. He flew from Madrid in a Government aeroplane with several bullet holes in its wings.

The Geneva correspondent of “The Times’’ says that the very composition of the council is in the melting pot. There has long been deep dissatisfaction with the system of permanently excluding certain ungrouped Powers from representation on the Council and the creation of an extra non-per-manent seat is not regarded as going sufficiently far. The “Manchester Guardian’s” Geneva correspondent says that there has been much comment on the mysterious last-minute addition to the agenda of the League on the question of prohibiting under the provisions of the Covenant the supply of arms and war material to belligerents. Everyone is asking why the question has suddenly been taken up after two years of inaction and at whose instance it has been raised.

A London cable dated September 17 stated that the “Daily Telegraph" said that momentous issues confronted the League. Therefore Britain would be represented by a delegation of 70, including Mr. Anthony Eden, Lord Cranborne. Lord Halifax, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, and Mr. W. S. Morrison.

Almost every subject on the agenda is controversial. The question of League reform is expected to be referred to a political committee. More than a dozen ..Governments, including France. Russia and New Zealand, have sent memorandums on the subject. Britain will state her views in the course of the discussions, but considers that reform of the League is at present not practical politics. France has decided to take the initiative in two directions: First, armament limitations, and, secondly, improving the disastrous economic situation in Europe. SELASSIE’S REQUEST Extraordinary Session of World Court (Received September 18, 7.50 p.m.) London, September 17. Haile Selassie's have tele graphed the Permanent Court of International Justice asking that they be authorised to apply for the convening of an extraordinary session to hear the case of Ethiopia in the matter of the breach of international law by Italy.