BETWEEN BRITAIN AND FRANCE

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 35, 10 August 1921, Page 5

BETWEEN BRITAIN AND FRANCE

THE SILESIAN QUESTION

REAL CRUX OF MATTER

DEFINED.

, VBNITBB FRESS ASSOCIATION.—COFTMBBT.) (AUIIIULMN ■ NEW ZJALMD CAILI ASSOC'VHeN.) LONDON,'9th. August. The Daily Chronicle's correspondent at Paris says that an" informal dinner talk on Sunday enabled-Mr. Lloyd George and M. Briand to create an easier atmosphere. When the Supreme Council assembled oil" Monday, M. Briand consented to postpone the question 'of reinforcements, and deal with the political issue first. The real crux thus became whether Britain on the^one side is prepared to admit the -principle that the industrial tViangle in Upper Silesia be divided, and whether France, on the other hand, is prepared to modify her proposed frontier line, making it just for the whole of Germany. The British unalterable view is that the. alignment of the new Polish-German frontier must leave Germany,, reasonably contented. After the postponement of the reinforcements question, the legal experts were requested to present their viewpoints. 'The French expert formulated a scheme which gives the industrial areas to Poland, reversing the result of the plebiscite to the extent of giving sevenelevenths of the population which voted for Germany to Poland. Sir Cecil Hurst (legal adviser to the Foreign Office) explained the British proposals. Firstly, the communes must be allotted according to the country for which they voted; secondly, the isolations of the communes must be avoided; thirdly, communes economically or geo- ' graphically inseparable must not be divided. He-pointed out that the population concerned numbered two millions, in 1522 communes, 678 of which voted for Poland and 844 for Germany—thir-teen-,thirtieth3 for Poland, and seventeenthirtieths for Germany.