FRANCE AND THE SAAR

Grey River Argus, 21 February 1947, Page 5

FRANCE AND THE SAAR

Economic Union Wanted

LONDON, Feb. 20.

The French Cabinet has unanimously approved M. Bidault’s plans for a customs and economic union of the Saar with France. The “Daily Telegraph’s” correspondent says: The plans will be ready for next month's Four Power Moscow Conference. The French Government are not demanding a political union at present, but they are hoping that areas that were transferred from the Rhineland to the Saar last July will be accepted by the Allies as part of the Saar territory, despite German objections.

BRITISH ATTITUDE TO RUHR.

HOSTSILE TO FRENCH WISHES.

LONDON, Feb. 19.

French diplomatic circles are disappointed with the British draft of the proposed alliance. It is felt that the public will be disappointed to find' Britain again refusing to support the Ruhr’s economic and political separation, thus dividing Britain and France on a crucial point which might become A great menace to European peace. The Communist Party informed the Assembly’s Foreign Affairs Committee that it opposed the conclusion of an Anglo French pact before the Foreign Ministers’ conference at Moscow.

French diplomatic circles consider the British treaty draft much weaker than expected and “only a shadow of what the French thought it to be,” says the Exchange Telegraph’s Paris correspondent. They claim it would bind the two countries in a closer common action than the Franco-Soviet alliance signed in 1944 and would only operate if Germany was in a position to carry out aggressive action against Britain, France and Belgium. It does not give any more guarantee than the United Nations except that it would help in the event of German aggression before the United Nations could move.