HOT COMPLETE FAILURE

Evening Star, Issue 25928, 21 October 1946, Page 7

HOT COMPLETE FAILURE

MR MASON REVIEWS PARIS CONFERENCE STILL HOPE FOR SOLUTIONS i (N.Z.P.A. Special Correspondent.) LONDON, October 19. “ Much disappointment has doubtless been felt because the ' Paris Peace Conference failed to ' solve the problems which the j world was hoping to see settled. The large amount of time spent on matters of procedure tended to give a gloomy view as to the spirit and therefore the outcome of the conference. But a feeling of unrelieved - disappointment, in my opinion, is unjustified,” Mr H. G. R. Mason said on his arrival in London from Paris. After visiting Ireland and Scotland ho expects to fly to New Zealand, leaving on November 5. “There remains the/fact that after 11 strenuous weeks of difficult and exacting work the conference failed to reach agreement on any of the principal problems referred to it by the , Council of Foreign Ministers,” he said. “ Nevertheless it would be a mistake to allow this to induce a pessimistic view as to the prospect of satisfactory solutions being found.” It became apparent at an early stage that the conference was not a body well adapted • to solving delicate international prob- . lems, he continued. The provision that full publicity should be given to the proceedings was well-intentioned, but it often resulted in delegates speaking to a wider audience as much as to their fellow delegates, and preconceived views tended to be declared instead of more conciliatory ones. The procedure had been described .as “parliamentary,” but it was misleading to think of the Peace Conference as analagous to Parliament. Parliamentary methods were not designed to secure unity between two opposing parties, and could not be taken as the best guide for conciliation and agreement. The New Zealand, delegates approached. the conference with clearlydefined ideas as to the methods which should be adopted to produce a just and lasting peace, but efforts to give effect to those ideas resulted in keen disappointment. - . UNSUCCESSFUL CRUSADE.

“ We believed that many of the difficult problems of the treaties would be better solved by the United Nations than by the Council of Foreign Ministers;” Mr Mason said. “We therefore urged closer association with the United Nations for a solution of contentious issues; but unhappily our efforts met with no success. We proposed, for instance, that the United Nations should determine the future administration of the Italian colonies, ensuring that the wishes of the inhabitants should be given first consideration, and affording some, prospect of a satisfactory settlement. But the course adopted gives no such assur- , ance, as there is not much likelihood of agreement on the question by the Foreign Ministers’ Council. “ We also proposed that the level of armaments in former enemy States should be fixed by the Security Council, and asked that the establishment of United Nations machinery to guar- ' antee the rights and liberties of individual citizens should be encouraged. • When it became evident that other . delegations showed no enthusiasm for this line of action, but were even opposed, to it, we refrained from delay- : ing the conference by insistently pressing views that had already been rejected after discussion.” " Mr Mason added that the New Zealand delegation supported the French proposals for Trieste,, and, though being of the opinion that it did not go. far enough,, was satisfied with the Italo-Austriaii agreement regarding - the Tyrol. The delegation welcomed the restoration of Ethiopia’s independence and the return of the Dodecanese to Greece.' The delegation felt considerable sympathy for the aims and needs of Czecho-Slovakia and its proposal that the Hungarians should be •• called on to negotiate with the Czechs on the transfer of Hungarians was unanimously adopted. Dissatisfaction was felt over the course adopted regarding Greece’s northern frontier.; Mr Mason also observed that the fate of amendments passed by the conference depended largely on the attitude of the Soviet.