FRENCH PROPOSAL

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 57, 4 September 1937, Page 9

FRENCH PROPOSAL

COLLECTIVE ACTION

NO TOLERATION OF PIRACY

LOKDON, September 3.

The "Daily Telegraph's" diplomatic correspondent understands that France will propose that the warships of all the Powers concerned take collective action against pirate submarines and war vessels. The effect of this would be that the warships of any nation would go to the rescue of any attacked merchantman, not confining their protection to ships flying their own flag.

"There is no doubt in the minds of the British Ministers regarding the situation in the Mediterranean," the correspondent says. "Signor Mussolini's recent declaration not to tolerate Bolshevism -or anything like it on the shores of the Mediterranean may perhaps be followed by an Anglo-French resolve not to tolerate piracy or anything like it upon the waters of the Mediterranean."

A message from Rome says the newspapers are united in their contention that the only remedy against piracy is the granting to General Franco of belligerency rights, "which would clarify the position. The French sloops DTberville and Iphigenie and the flotilla leader Verdun have arrived at Algiers to protect French shipping on the routes from France to Algeria.

LONDON, September 3.

The Admiralty attaches no importance to.the story of the crew of the Havock that oil floating on the sea indicated that the submarine which attacked the destroyer was sunk.

It was officially announced at Portsmouth today that the sailing'of H.M.S. Warspite for the Mediterranean to take up her duties as flagship of the commander-in-chief has been postponed owing- to defects in her machinery.