TURKEY'S DESIRES

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 154, 27 December 1912, Page 7

TURKEY'S DESIRES

RETENTION OF IMPORTANT CITIES COUNTER-PROPOSALS FOR PEACE CONFEEENCE. Bj TMeiraph.— tresi Association .--Copyright, CONSTANTINOPLE, 26th Dec. The Government ha« discussed the situation, and it is understood that the Turkish delegate is instructed to submit a cotmter-propoeal on Saturday, including the retention of Adrianople, Seres, and Salonika. v ' SUPPRESSING SMALLPOX. GREEKS' REMARKABLE SANATORY SYSTEM. SALONIKA, 26th December. The Greeks have established a remarkable sanatory eyeteni, including a microbiological laboratory. All the refugees are vaccinated, *and there is the strictest surveillance of butcheries, dairies, and restaurants. The smallpox outbreak is already suppressed. The Greek funds are insufficient to feed the 30,000 refugees. GERMANY LADY MISTAKEN AS A SPY. t BELGRADE, 26th December. While shopping at Semlin, in Hungary, Baroness Greidinger, wife of the German Minister at Belgrade, was arrested on suspicion that she was a Servian sky. After & protracted examination she was released. PEACE CONFERENCE SUBJECTS FOR DISCUSSION. Most of the plenipotentiaries at the conference' at St. James's Palace, which is discussitfg the terms on which peace may be brought about in the Balkans, are undistinguished in the larger field of international politics, and in this respect the London Congress differs from the last important gathering which dealt with Near Eastern problems— the Cott' gress of Berlin of 1878. Among the statesmen who assembled in the German capital on that occasion were the Eatl of Beaconsfteld and the Marquis of Salisbury (representing Great Britain), Prince Bismarck, Baron Ernst yon Bulow, and Prince Hohenlohe, who succeeded Caprivi as German Chancellor (representing Germany) ; Count Andrassy, the first constitutional Hungarian Premier, and "the providential statesman given to Hungary by the grace o? God" (fcrepTeeenting Austria); Prince Gortchakoff, the Ru66ian Chancellor (representing Russia), and M. WadfHngton (representing France). All these me nwere of outstanding reputation, and it is safe to assume that their successors are of legs eminent calibre. Whilst the members of the conference will doubtless be free to discuss the whole of the circumstances arising out of the waft, says the Sydney Morning Herald^ it may be assumed that attention will be concentrated on the following poifltfii— 1. The Sandjak of Novi Bazar. Thig narrow tongue of territory lying between Montenegro and Servia, is now in the occupation of those two countries. It is clear that it will not be permitted to remain part of the Turkish Dominions, and its future will depend on whether Austria will insist on its forming part of an autonomous province or whether she will consent to its complete annexation. 2. The Adriatic coast. Servia is bent, in order to secure hei* economic independence, on securing a port on the Adriatic, connected by railway with her country. In many -ways this is the crucial point of the whole conference. Austria and Italy are averse to territorial annexation by Servia on the Adriatic coast, and such solutions as a free port connected by an internationalised Tailway passing through a neutral Albanian province will be discussed. 3. Albania. Parts of Albania, in the north, are in the possession of Montenegro, who will certainly demand territorial extensions, including a town of some size (Which she does not at present possess) like Skutati, and low-lying country, where she can grow food for her people. In the south, Greece demands Epirus and Janina, where Greek inhabitants predominate. The Albanians themselves are demanding autonomy, and the creation of a self-governing p-ro-yiuce for the whole of centraf Albania, including the strip skirting the Adriatic, with sufficient safeguards for the preservation of order, will be one of the most important matters for negotiation. 4. Macedonia.— -Taking this term to include the whole of European Turkey lying between Albania on the west and the province of Adrianople on the east, and bounded on the north by Servia and Bulgaria and on the sooth by the yEgean Sea, consideration will doubtless be directed to the following parts of the Macedonian problem:— (a) Salonika. — The future of this important seanort and commercial centre will be considered apart from other decisions concerning the territory, of which it is the chief city. Prominence has been given to the necessity for placing the town under Internationa] control, in order to reconcile conflicting interests, and the suggestion has been made by leading publicists in the English press that its government should be handed over to the Jewish population, who predominate in Salonika. (b) Kossovo. — This province, which formed part of the ancient Servian Kingdom, and Includes ttokub, where the famous Servian Emperor, Dushan, was crowned, will certainly be demanded by Servia as the indispensable reward for her victories. The only real difficulty will be the railway to Salonika, in which Austria in interested. (c) The question of the creation of new autonomous provinces of parts pf Macedonia will doubtless be considered. Otherwise it would seem as if Monastir would pass into the hands of the Servians, and the district between Salonika and the Grecian frontier into the hands of Greece. (d) The Bulgarian territorial claim will probably be to be placed in the same position as was conceded by the Treaty of Stefano. This gave Bulgaria the wholo of the atrip of territory lying between Eastern Rumelia arid the JMge&n Sea It' is here that the Bulgarian inhabitants of Turkey are to bo found in largest numbers, and the whole district is now in the occupation of Bulgarian troops. In addition, that part of the country which adjoins Bulgaria proper and UeS south of Djumala will also be demanded. 5. So far as territory ia concerned, there remain Adrianople (upon the possession of which the Bulgarians at present appear to insist) and Constantinople, together with the districts adjoining both cities. Assuming that the Allies obtain the substance_ of their demands in other directions, it may be assumed that the time of the conference will not be much taken up with any question of territorial transfer in this part of the Ottoman dominions. But some security for good government and protection for

the" Christian inhabitants will without doubt be demanded. 6. The question of indemnity usually arises after a decisive war. In this instance it will be largely a case of attempting to extract blood from a stone, although the matter will probably be raised. 7. The islands in the .ffigean Sea, S.ome of these are in the possession of Greece, who certainly will demand their cession. FORMER CONFERENCES. The present is by no means the first international conference which has been held in London, although it 16 to be hoped that it will be more successful than some which have taken place in the British capital. In the summer of 1827 a Conference took place between representatives of Austria, Prussia, France, Russia, and Great Britain, to discuss the problem of Greece. It wa* only partially successful, ac Prussia and Austiia withdrew, declining to participate in any agreement calculated "to serve revolutionary ends." The other three Powers, however, signed the Treaty of London on 6th July, which stipulated fo* 1 the creation of a Grecian State un dfr the suzerainty of the ; Sultan. Then came the War of Independence, and on 7tU May, 1832, another Treaty of London was signed, by which Greece became an independent kingdom. On 15th November, 1831. the treaty by which Belgium and Holland became separated was signed in London, and on 19th April. 1839, a convention was held in London with regard to Belgian matters. The following year a treaty affecting Turkey and Egypt was signed in London, and in 1852 the succession of the Crown of Denmark was settled after a London conference, whilst in 1867 the neutrality of Luxembourg was secured by a treaty signed in London. In 1871 a conference was held in London to consider the Tsar's claim, under the Treaty of Paris, to possess warshipß on the Black Sea, and in 1884 the affairs of Egypt were the sllbject of a conference in Lohdon, in which. Representatives of Great Britain, Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, and Turkey took part. It adjourned without result sine die. A similar fate had befallen a conference of the chief European Powers, which eat between 25th April and 25th June, 1864, with the view of reconciling, Austria, Prussia, and Denmark. There have, 6f course, been innumerable conferences in other European cities to discuss the near Eastern problem. Of these the chief have been at Paris (1856), at the close of the Crimean War. atf? Berlin (1872), at the close of the Ruseo-Turkifih War.