POST-WAR SECURITY

Evening Star, Issue 25172, 11 May 1944, Page 9

POST-WAR SECURITY

SOUTH-WEST PACIFIC REGIONAL DEFENCE ZONE PROPOSED ! Press Association—By Telegraph—Copy ngnt LONDON, May 9. ■ The Australian and New Zealand plan for a regional defence zone comprising the South-west Pacific may be adopted as the pattern for an Empirewide, system-of post-war security as the result of to-day's discussions, at the dominion Prime Ministers' conference, which.at. present is .giving attention to the military aspects of, Mr ,Eden's political plans for maintaining peace. It is believed that the Australian Prime Minister, Mr J. Curtin, emphasised that Australia was anxious immediately to enter into a British Commonwealth or international agreement for policing the islands jportli of Australia.

The fate of Mr Curtin's plan for an Empire secretariat, which is the most widely publicised of all the subjects before the conference, is likely to be settled within the next day or two, when the Prime Ministers will proceed to study defence co-operation within the Empire. The remaining sessions are likely to be taken up with discussions on migration, which will be linked with post-war employment plans; communications, which will include, administration; and imperial communications, which will include civil aviation and shipping.' Mr Curtin has already prepared a clear-cut colonial policy based on the doctrine of trusteeship, under which he proposes establishing a South Seas Regional Commission representing .Australia, New Zealand, Britain, America, and possibly the French Committee of Liberation.

Economic policy in relation to countries outside the Empire has been the subject of some of the longest discussions between the Prime Ministers, who again called irf the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir John Anderson, at the beginning of to-day's sitting. The conference is expected to conclude on Mav 15.

The Prime Ministers attended a meeting of the War Cabinet. to-day, thus being enabled to hear the latest information about the progress of the war in all theatres and take, a share of the responsibility for planning and, conducting the day-to-day operations. Meetings of the Dominions' Conference were held at 10 Downing Street in the morning and evening, when Mr Churchill and the dominion Prime Ministers continued the examination of the Empire's post-war defence problems, including world security, the prevention of aggression, and the preservation of peace.