THE GERMAN COLONIES

Evening Star, Issue 16625, 7 January 1918, Page 6

THE GERMAN COLONIES

HELD IN TRUST. THE NATIVES' EIGHTS AND HUN METHODS. TURKEY'S PROSPECTS. LONDON, January 6. (Received January 7, at 8.55 a.m.) Mr Lloyd George continued: " While we do not challenge the maintenace of the Turkish Empire in the homelands of the Turkish race, with its capital at Constantinople, the narrow passage between the Mediterranean and Black Seas must be internationalised and neutralised. Arabia, Armenia, and Mesopotamia are, in our judgment, entitled to the recognition of their separate national conditions, but exact forms of such recognition in each, particular case need not here be discussed, beyond stating that it is impossible to restore these territories to their former sovereignty.

Begarding the German colonies, I have repeatedly declared that they are being held for disposal by a conference, whose decision mmt have primary regard to the wishes and interests of the native, inhabitants. None of those territories are inhabited by Europeans, therefore the governing consideration in all these cases must be that the inhabitants should bo placed under the control of an administration acceptable to themselves, one of whoso main purposes must be to prevent their exploitation for the .benefit of European capitahste or governments. . The natives should hve in their various tribal organisations under their chiefs and councils, who must be competent to consult with and speak for their tribes, and thus represent their wishes and interests regarding their disposal. The general principle of national self-determination,' therefore, is as applicable in their cases as in those of the occupied European territories.

The German declaration that the natives of German colonies have, through their military fidelity in the war, shown their attachment to and resolve under all circumstances to remain with Germany, is applicable, not to the German colonies generally, but only to one of them—namely, German Bast Africa. But in that case the German authorities have secured the attachment, not of the native population as a whole, which remains profoundly antiGerman but only of small warlike classes from whom their Askaris or soldiers are selected. These they have attached to themselves by conferring highly-privileged posts, as against the bulk of the native population, which enabled the Askaris to assume a lordly and oppressive superiority over the rest of the natives. By this and other means the Germans secured the attachment of a very small and insignificant minority, whose interests are directlv opposed to those of the rest of the population, for whom they have no right to speak. The ,German treatment of the native populations of their colonies is such as to have amply justified their fear of submitting the future of those colonies to the wishes of the nativeSithemselyes."