POWERS AT LAUSANNE

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 142, 17 June 1932, Page 7

POWERS AT LAUSANNE

MUST ACT.QUICKLY

WORLD WAITS IMPATIENT^

MACDONALD EMPHATIC'

(British Official Wireless,) [Received 17th June, noon.)*

RUGBY, 16th June.

During his opening . address 'as chairman to the delegates, of 18 nations assembled at the Reparations Conference at Lausanne to-day Mr. Ramsay Mac Donald stressed thej.ex* treme gravity and urgency of -the problem confronting them. The economic crisis,: he said, was such - that no country could expect to be immune from its effect. It was a world crisis, and none could stay out of the work of restoration'and-reconstruc-tion. They were to consider one of the causes of their distress— the financial inheritance of the war- — and an agreement must be reached regarding it. '

He cited the report of! Basle experts which insisted that inter-government debts must be revised, 'arid declared that. the urgency of their appeal had been underlined by all that hftfL happened since that "report-had been issued^

They must remember in ali theic^de' liberations and bargainings that "the world looked' to them'not only: in need! but with, impatience. It was the essence of their, task that they should act speedily, f or; an;. ■ ■ agreement , reached quickly would have an x effect : a , hundred times more beneficial than* ~bne painfully and imperfectly secured -at the last moment of exhaustion. ■---,

One principle definitely (before' the Conference was that 'an engagement solemnly entered/into -could not be satisfied by unilateral repudjatioiUciHe believeE that. the principle- ■wtas- "-}«>* challenged by any of the.delegates^bnt; it carried the corollary tha^-if t&w> was to be no default, : engagement* which had proved incapable of fulfilment must'be. revised by. agreement. T

Mr. Mac Donald ( added": «fI jbeliev* that "a great ' opportunity: :i«iw,'-pre-sents itself for us to iimte,ii;ißh«c)c--ing the active influences nowI', making for general-economic- deterioration. If we do this;/Europe cannot; aei'alone. We must ail welcome the assuranea that after the present' phase is 'over the United States Iwjll encourage^ vB to believe she will co-operate itt.ia examination at any. rate of ;:the' yii&etproblems and join with ■■ iis :■ in t devising a policy for the, maihtenanee* «£ a civilisation which shall be baseftoaj the prosperity, of- all nations.**";.;-- -.'.-,.

..-. The Conference, after its bpeningf;sit(« iing, adjourned until to-inorroTir,. the: interval being • spent .in. arranging:'^%h* programme-of work. 'sb' ." . v I Both'to-morrow's meetings wiU u'l»« held- privately.-, , Discussionß . will: ba opened by the German Chancellor, Hert yon Papen,' with a -statement on many's economic situation.' \ >. -/■' s