SUSPICIOUS FRANCE.

Gisborne Times, Volume LXVIII, Issue 10724, 23 October 1928, Page 5

SUSPICIOUS FRANCE.

CONFERENCE OF DAWES PAY- . ME NT FINANCIERS.

SECRET WELL KEPT

UNEASINESS OVER "CHEWING GUM” DEBT.

United Press Aesn. by .El. Tel. Copyright (United Service.> (Received Oct. 22, 7.50 p.m.) . * - 1 -PARIS, - Oct. 21.

All. the newspapers confess that the secret of'the conference between M. Poincaire,' Mr Churchill and Mr Parker Gilbert has been splendidly kept, though most of them are disposed to suspect something inimical to France. . - * L’lntransigeant says it is all very well for Mr Gilbert and Mr Churchill to say that The Dawes plan is a burden crushing Germany, but until Mr Gilbert convinces the * -United States that the inter-Allied debts-are a crushing burden on France arid settlement, and that one" depends upon the other, nothing can be dori'e. Well infOrttiod circles assert that M. Poincare, as a means of inducing tho United States’ collaboration in reparations negotiations', will shortly'ask the Chamber, to ratify the Melion-Bernger debt agreement which France is already carrying out. Failing ratification. France, next August, will ha% r e to Tiny America four hundred billion dollars, popularly called her "chewing gum” debt.

FRANCE’S DEBT TO AMERICA. UnitedT.Pranfl Assn, by, El. TeU Oopyrigb’ ” (Australian Press Asiooiation.i '(lle'ceiveci ,Gcb. 22, 11.25 p.m.) LONDON, Oct. 22. The. Morning Post’s" Paris correspondent says that- it is generally conceded that the ratification of France’s debt settlement to America is a necessary-preliminary to the financial arrangement as proposed. The flotation of -the German railway industrial ' bonds', ' which are valued at eight- hundred million sterling, would be impossible if the American market were unfriendly. . It is believed Mr Parker Gilbert suggested 1 that Germany’s liabilities be fixed at between fifteen hundred million and seventeen hundred- and_ fifty million, while the . annual annuities of. 125 million; should be reduced to 100 million: