GROTESQUE

Feilding Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 4589, 15 May 1922, Page 2

GROTESQUE

DELEGATIONS AT GENOA. INTRIGUERS FROM THE EAST. (By Electric Cable—Copyright.) (Aust.-N.Z. Cable Association.) (Received May 15, 9.50 a.m.) (United Service). London, May 13. The Evening News Genoa correspondent says a grotesque conference side show is tho motley array of envoys of the grandiloquently selfstyled League of Oppressed Nations of tho East, comprising Anatolians, Egyptians, Palestinians, Syrians, Mesopotamians. Persians, Boyliarans, and Indians. In the intervals of qpnspiring with and against each other, they flock to the largest and most dubious dance resort in Genoa. The notorious Enver Pasha is the prime instigator of this gathering, whose declared aim is to examine the Oriental problems with reference to Europe. His spokesmen are Bekir Bey and Sami Pasha, whom the Angora Government (Kemal Pasha’s Cabinet) expelled, also General Ilakki Pasha. Mustapha Kemal Pasha himself sent a delegate, Djellallahin Bey, from Angora, but lie does not speak to Bekir or to Hakka. Tlie first formal act of this ••mixed conference was to send a Note to the President of the Genoa Conference, protesting against British control ol the Suez Canal and the Soudan. This Note was, naturally, ignored. ASTUTE LLOYD GEORGE. STILL SAVING THE SITUATION. London, May 14. The Australian Press Association’s Genoa correspondent says that only Mr Lloyd George’s skilfulness as a negotiation has tided over . tlie Conference’s usual week-end crisis in the face of France’s positive determination not to sit with the Russians on any commission. It appealed as if France must finally withdraw from Genoa. Franco ever since the first invitation to meet the Bolsheviks at Prinkipo in 1919 has c onsistently refused to have anything to do with them. There have been rumours as to a compromise which Mr Lloyd George had effected with M. Bar thou.. But the most reasonable assumption is that lie agreed that two commissions should be formed —one consisting of Russians and the other of the Allies and neutrals. This is a somewhat transparent device to save France’s amour propre. But such commissions must actually sit together if any suecess is to be obtained. It is quite impossible for both commissions to work by exchanging notes. Tlie next interesting point is what the Russians think of such a scheme.