DISASTROUS REALITY

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 50, 27 August 1937, Page 9

DISASTROUS REALITY

LOSSES IN SHANGHAI

BRITONS COUNT THE COST

(British Official Wireless.) (Received August 27, 11.40 a.m.) ; , ■■~.'■ RUGBY, August 26. , ;At the conclusion o£ the Prime Minister's meetings yesterday with the Foreign Secretary* Mr. Eden, and Lord Halifax, when in particular the latest information regarding the situation in the Far East was examined and the' broad lines of British policy already announced were confirmed and in part extended, the Prime Minister travelled by the night express to Balmoral, where he will spend the weekend as the guest of the King. M,r. Chamberlain, who had travelled up from Scotland on the previous night, spent twelve hours in London. A statement issued .after yesterday's meetings observed with satisfaction the close collaboration that has been maintained with other Governments, especially the American and French, and added that they regard it as most important that such collaboration should continue. , Referring to the Japanese decision to strike hardest in Shanghai, which is the centre of huge foreign interests, "The Times" says that the result of the Japanese action since that decision was taken has in many cases made the danger of loss a disastrous reality. The latest impartial estimates put the value- of British interests in Yangtzepoo, which district of Shanghai is already the most battered and most threatened, at £170,000,000. .The whole

area north and east of Soochow Creek has often been called the Japanese district, because several hundred Japanese small traders have set up there. It could much more rightly be called a British district, for in it are the British Utility Company—water, gas, and electricity—and large factories and warehouses. .