NAVAL AGREEMENT

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 94, 22 April 1931, Page 9

NAVAL AGREEMENT

FRANCE AND ITALY

STATEMENT BY HENDERSON

(British Official Wireless.)

BUGBY, 20th April

Questioned in the House of! Commons as to tho present position of ihc negotiations between .Franco and Italy concerning the naval agreement, Mr. Arthur Henderson, Foreign Secretary, said that tho drafting committee was engaged in preparing declarations which were to, give effect to the busis of the agreement.

Certain difficulties which had arisen were under consideration between the Ihreo Governments represented on the committee. He added that there was no foundation for tho 'statement; that the British Government was not willing to proceed at the present time.

On 19lh April the "Observer's" diplomatic oditor stated that, although tho drafting committee would meet again, the Franco-Italian naval agreemont was dead.

The question shortly would arise as to whether the London Treaty itself could withstand the further expansion of French naval armaments. Naturally, patience would be strained to tho limit before the Governments of Britain, the United States, and Japan accepted tho consequences of tho'French policy, but the prospects were regarded with misgiving.