PEACE EFFORTS FAIL

Greymouth Evening Star, 18 April 1936, Page 7

PEACE EFFORTS FAIL

ITALY REJECTS LEAGUE AID

FRANCE AND SANCTIONS

[BY CABLE —PRESS ASSN. —COPYRIGHT.]

(Received April IS. 8 a.m.) LONDON, April 17

The "Telegraph’s” Geneva correspondent says: The Italian terms mean that Italy is to impose a settlement on Abyssinia, without League participation or mediation. The League "will be permitted merely to register the settlement as an accomplished fact. Unless, therefore there is some entirely unexpected and unlikely development, the Committee of Thirteen, when it meets will have no alternative but to record the failure of its peace efforts, entailing the summoning of the Committee of Eighteen, for the purpose of examining the effect of existing Sanctions and deciding whether new ones should be enforced.

’l'he ..‘.‘Mail’s:’ .Geneva—carrespondent. says': If the question of further Sanctions is raised M. Boncour' will demand that the discussion be postponed until after the French general election.

“The Times’s” Geneva correspondent says: Italy refuses to negotiate an armistice, because she holds this must be settled by the armies in the field. The Abyssinian Commanders, it is implied, can secure an armistice by making that admission of defeat which Italy claims she is entitled to expect from the present militarv situation whereon any peace must be based. The Abyssinians, however, do not consider themselves defeated. It is still, they declare, a race with the rains, and the time factor is as important for one side as the other..

ABYSSINIA’S REFUSAL

GENEVA, April 17

Senor Madariaga conferred with the Abyssinian delegates, acquainting them with the Italian viewpoint. Abyssinia categorically rejected the Italian conditions for peace discussions. The Committee of Thirteen has been summoned to record the failure of conciliation.

OFFICIAL COMMUNIQUE

[BRITISH OFFICIAL WIRELESS.]

RUGBY, April 17.

There will be a meeting of the League Council in connection with the Italo-Abyssinian dispute on Monday, at Geneva. Press reports from Geneva indicate that the meeting is thought to have registered the failure of the procedure of conciliation, but a communique records merely that the Chairman stated that the instructions given him to obtain information, with the assistance of the Secretary General, might be regarded as fulfilled, and adds that the Committee will meet tomorrow afternoon, to draw up a report for submission to the Council on Monday. The communique opens with the terms of the Ethiopian rejection of the modified Italian proposals, which are described by the Ethiopian delegation as direct negotiations between Italian and Ethiopian delegations, about which the Committee of Thirteen would be kept informed. The delegation could 'find no substantial difference between these proposals and those it had rejected yesterday, and therefore, while renewing its loyal unreserved acceptance of appeals by the Council for peace, it called upon the Committee of Thirteen to declare the Italian Government had not agreed to negotiate within the framework of the League, and in the light of the Covenant.

No arrangements have been made for the meeting of the Committee of Eighteen, the members of which will continue as already advised, by their President, M. Vasconcellos, to stand by, but it is understood the experts have been asked to prepare a report on the effectiveness of the existing Sanctions, and the necessary measures, if any, to render them more -affective.

MUSSOLINI'S CLAIM

(Recd. April 18, 10 a.m.) ROME. April 17

Mussolini, in an article in “Popolo d’ltalia” says: “The most gigantic colonial expedition in the whole of history is approaching the end, despite the inhuman policy of Sanctions, whose supporters are now openly trying to sabotage our victory. It is the piratical face of Versailles that is re-ap-pearing, but the infamy of 1919 will not be repeated. Our triumph will not be mutilated. The victory against Abyssinia, which has been won at the cost of blood, gold and strenuous resistance, is a victory of the whole Italian people. It is sacred, inviolable and intangible.”

CAPTURE OF DESSIE

LONDON, April 16.

“The Times’s” Rome correspondent says: Despite contrary reports, the Italian official communique reveals that the honour of occupying Dessie fell to the native troops under the command of General Pirzio Birolli.

Twenty thousand of these troops now occupy the town and its neighbourhood. The populace are slowly returning to Dessie. The “Daily Mail’s” Dessie correspondent says: All along tne line of the Abyssinian retreat from Quoram to Dessie there were found hundreds of dead warriors with spear wounds and scimitar wounds, thus conclusively proving that they had fallen in hand-to-hand encounters with nonAmharic tribesmen, who thus wreaked vengeance on them for the past oppressions. “The Times’s” Cairo correspondent states: —Signor Gasperini, ex-Gover-nor of Eritrea, who took up his residence there after the retirement, has established an excellent intelligence service among the non-Amharic tribes of Abyssinia, whose chiefs have spread Italian propaganda of disaffection. These tribes not only assisted in the Abyssinian deieat at Amba Alagi, but they compelled Emperor Selassie to give battle at Lake Ashangi on ground that was most favourable for the Italian artillery and aircraft. Moreover the Italians countered the Abyssinian tactics of emerging from the bush to attack the Italian flanks, by drenching the bush with gas. The correspondent adds: News from the Sudan confirms the retreat of the Abyssinian northern armies, who can-

not rally unless rains should terminate the Italian aerial activity. THE LAST STAND. (Recd. April 18, 10.30 a.m.). LONDON, April 17. The “Morning Post’s” special correspondent, who has just returned from Abyssinia, considers that rain will still foil the best-laid Italian plans. Moreover, the first strategic position since the last Abyssinian resistance, lies a few miles from Addis Ababa, where thousands of Abyssinians could gather behind a ' vertical escarpment, and protect the ten-mile front. Everything seems to depend on the Emperor’s ability to organise a fiuai resistance. The Italians cannot employ gas, whicn was the chief factor in the rapid advance, because it is too near the capital. On the contrary, the stocks of Abyssinian arms are believed to be very low. The whereabouts of the Emperor is still veiled in mystery. He may be cut off behind the Italian lines.

EMPEROR’S MESSAGE. (Recd. April 18, 10.30 a.m.) ADDIS ABABA, April 17. The Emperor sent a message stating that he is well, and is accompanied by 20,000 troops. The reports that he intends fleeing to Kenya, are described as ridiculous. BOMBERS OVER CAPITAL. (Recd. April 8, 10.30 a.m.) ADDIS ABABA, April 17. Italian bombers flew over Addis Ababa, and released smoke clouds of red, green and yellow, the Italian colours.

BOMBING RED CROSS.

ANGLO-ITALIAN NOTES.

[BRITISH OFFICIAL WIRELESS.]

RUGBY, April 17.

The correspondence between the United Kingdom and the Italian Governments, regarding the bombing by Italian military aircraft of the British Red Cross in Ethiopia, is published as a White Paper.

The Italian aide memoire, basing itself on reports from Marshal Badoglio, seeks to identify the bombed British ambulance unit with an encampment from which it alleges reconnoitering Italian aircraft were fired upon on March 3 and 4, after which upon the latter date, it is admitted they proceeded to the bombardment of the camp. It is claimed that the dense smoke which arose, confirmed the suspected existence of a munition dump in the camp. The Italian Government 1 accordingly protests energetically against the most grave, repeated and flagrant violations of the fundamental principles of the Geneva Convention. The British note states: His Majesty’s Government, after carefully considering the above statements and comparing them with the, reports furnished by medical officers in charge of the ambulance, are unable to accept the Italian version of the facts as having any relation to what actually occurred. The note recites the warnings ot the presence of the British unit on the northern front, communicated to the Italian authorities in advance, and the precautions taken by the medical officer-in-charge to maintain the unit at a proper distance from the Ethiopian military encampments, and to display Red Cross emblems clearly, and repeats the accounts furnished by Dr. Melly, of the deliberate bombing of his Red Cross lorries on March 3, and of the camp on March 4. The Note rejects the attempt of the Italian Government to justify the attack under Article 7 of the Red Cross Convention, first, because the facts put forward in justification of the attack are incorrect, and, secondly, because even if they were correct, they would not in the view of His Majesty’s Government constitute any valid legal defence for the action of the Italian Air Force.

The Note makes a request for a categorical assurance that clear and definite instructions will be issued to Italian military authorities in Ethiopia to prevent a repetition of the attacks on British Red' Cross units, and, in conclusion, reserves the right of His Majesty’s Government at the appropriate time and in an appropriate manner to claim compensation for the heavy material losses suffered by the British ambulance service in Ethiopia.