ITALIANS AND TUNIS

Greymouth Evening Star, 4 February 1939, Page 9

ITALIANS AND TUNIS

ORIGIN OF CLAIMS. There is nothing new in Italy’s interest in Tunis. When we remember that the ruins of Cartilage are only six miles from the city of Tunis itself, we can realise the sentimental interest of the Italians in what was once the granary of Rome (writes William Teeling in the London “Sunday Tinies”).

For hundreds of years, right up to the beginning of the French Protect.t--i ate in 1881, Tunis was a thorn in the (Side of every European country tradzing in the Mediterranean. It was the | chief port for the famous Barbary pir- ; ates. England, too, had much trouble with the Bey, and there was one very awkward incident when we had to I send a man-of-war to threaten bom- ■ j bardment of the city, only to find that the somewhat difficult wife of George IV was actually on a visit to I the Bey in the Bardo Palace. But on the whole, the British were looked on as the Bey’s greatest friends, until a variety of European reasons forced them to look the other way when the French marched in. The French conquered, annexed, and made Algiers part of France in 1830. This meant the beginning of continual friction with the Bey of Tunis next door. The Bey’s family is Turkish inorigin, and in a sense the Bey of that time ruled Tunis as a Viceroy of the Sultan. In actual fact, the history of the country during last century was one of hopeless anarchy and of practical bankruptcy in the Palace. The French made several displays of force, outside the port of Tunis and along the frontier, between 1930 and 1878, but the Sardinians and the Sicilians made more frequent attempts to influence the Bey—in 1832, 1813, 1864, to mention the more important occasions. In 1871, when the new’ Kingdom of Italy saw how feeble France had become, she even reached the point of preparing an expeditionary force to invade Tunis. The British were, however, not asleep, and if the Italians staked a claim now because of those efforts of sixty and seventy years ago, so could the British, who also sent the Fleet there, and even then had a considerable number of Maltese subjects'living in Tunis, as there is today. But it was the Congress of Berlin which brought about the Protectorate. What Germany felt then is not without interest to-day. An Italian authority made the statement as recently as last year that Bismarck first suggested to the Italian delegate Mancini, that Italy should take Tunis. She refused, possibly not feeling strong enough. Thon Bismarck suggested it to France. His idea, we arc told, was to make this a bone of contention between Italy and France, and so to break up their friendship! Moreover, France would turn towards colonies and forget her grievances against Germany. Italy, sore and isolated, would be forced into an alliance with Germany and Austria, but as a very inferior third, and lastly, and most important, with her Western frontiers secured, Germany could pursue her policy of pushing towards the east and south-east. Things do not appear to have changed so very much since the years of Bismarck’s prime. Neither Austria nor Russia cared much about this plan, and Count Andrassy for Austria, in 1876, and General Ignatieff for Russia, in 1577, both suggested to Italy that she should occupy Tunis. Meantime, things had been getting very difficult for the Bey, who had neither power nor money. Italian canonists wjre pouring in and purchasing good land for practically nothing; an Italian company bought the railway from Tunis along the coast to La Marsa in 1880, and the British attempted to purchase huge areas of farming land. FRENCH PROTECTORATE.

The French, exasperated by the raids of the rebellious Tunisian tribesmen, into Algiers, invaded Tunis on April 24, 1881, and by May 12 a treaty had been signed with the Bey, making France the Protector of his dominions. From then on the matter became settled, and if there were any doubts they should surely have been put at rest when Laval and Mussolini came to an agreement early in 1935. In this agreement, Italy got what she wanted elsewhere, including a free hand in Abyssinia, and, in return, she agreed that the Italian schools in Tunis were to become French after 1945, and the 100,000 Italian subjects in that country were to become French after 1965. Such an amazing gesture on the part of Mussolini must show, first, that, he does not really believe in an Italian claim to Tunis, and, secondly, that he wants to use his grievances there, real oi* imaginary, as a bargaining counter. Yet, if he does not get his bargain, one feels that he might go to great lengths. What are the grievances? They can only be that some of the articles of the Treaty regulating the position of the Italians in Tunis are not being carried out to the letter. It is possibly so, but the privileges of the Italians are so great and so one-sided, that it is scarcely fair to expect the French to do more. 1

The Italians preserve for themselves the rights granted at different! times by successive Beys to the Sardinians and to the Sicilians and Neapolitans. They are under their own Consul; they pay taxes like the French, and not as in Italy, and so are much better off than their compatriots at home: they do not have to do military service in Italy, and only 700 volunteered for the Abyssinian war. They have advantages in Tunis which are not allowed to Tunisians in Libya. The Royal Italian schools are allowed to function entirely under the Consul’s control, though their number is limited; and the French have no control over the education of Italian children. In commercial matters, Italians in Tunis are well protected, and their boats can trade along the Libyan coast. The Italian consular authorities have complete control over the Italian ships, and when, this Summer, I travelled on one I had to go to the Italian authorities, and not to the French, for permission to board and to leave. With so many regulations there will obviously be occasional incidents, but in view of the fact that Tunis is virtually a French possession, the Italians are given, it would seem, a very reasonable latitude.

FASCISTS ACTIVE. It is true that there is a .large Italian population, mostly consisting of the descendants of people who migrated in the nineteenth century; it is nearly the largest Italian population outside Italy, numbering now nearly 100,000, scattered all along the coast, in prosperous villages, farms, and in Tunis itself. It is only, I believe, exceeded by tile Italian population in Marseilles, which is over 200,000, but

as these are not Fascists, presumably Mussolini will not claim to protect them.

The Fascist party in Tunis has been carefully developed since 1922; and quite openly members of it have told me recently that Tunis would belong to Italy within a year. But of that 100,000, the leading 6,000 are Italian Jews. Undoubtedly the Fascists have encouraged the Arab politicians, and found in the Destour (Constitutional) party a heaven-sent gift for agitation. After all, for fifty years the French have been educating the Arabs to take an interest in public affairs, and present results are not surprising. But the Arab Destournites arc now split into two parts; one, the old Destour party, which is bitterly anti-Chris-tion and so anti-Italian as well as antiFrench, and the other, the Neo-Destour party, which includes the irreligious students, the Communists, and the friends of Monsieur Blum. These can hardly see a friend in Italy. Nor at the moment do the Italian Jews ? n Tunis know what to do. Since the recent crisis, 3,000 of them have applied to become French citizens, which would make the French population just over 100.000. There arc over two and a-half million Arabs, and the African Jews, who have been in. Tunis well over 1,000 years, now number about 30,000.

What does it all mean'.’ Presumably that Italy realises what a convenient bargaining counter Tunis provides, and how very vulnerable it might be in war; but at the same time, she must realise also that if France were to surrender Tunis and the naval base at Bizerta, she would be abandoning her position as a Mediterranean Power, a Colonial Power, and a real world influence; and the Arabs, already frightened by the fate of their brothers in Libya. would be in despair. But the French are in no mood for surrender.