FAILURE AT GENEVA

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 97, 24 March 1926, Page 8

FAILURE AT GENEVA

DEBATE IN COMMONS

OLD DIPLOMACY BLAMED

CLASH BETWEEN METHODS,

Received March 24, 10.15 a.m. LONDON, March 24. Tho Tiines’s Genova correspondent says: “Tho discussions at Genova failed becauso they were the first clash betweon traditional diplomacy and the Leaguo machinery. Diplomacy is normally slow, but rapidity is essontial at Leaguo meetings, causing terrific intensity tho negotiations between fifty nations nocossitating six days’ work by the bid methods being done in one. “Yet its ramifications are endless. A trial could bo traced to the Far East and South America, with a maze of side tracks, resulting in issues too great to bo settled within ten days. “Probably Sir Austen Chamberlain erred throughout tho first week in negotiating solely with the Locamoites. Among those excluded were M. Franco, who may have resented it, resulting in the eventual stubbornness. Others, including Spain, also objected to Sir Austen Chamberlain’s methods.

“M. Briand persuaded Germany to nccept the Swedish and Czechoslovakian offers, but tho ship ho steered, laden with tho paraphernalia of the old diplomacy, crashed into tho League’s hull, resulting in both being damaged, disclosing tho old barque’s cuning dodges, threats and hidden motives. Tho Leaguo should not be Blamed for tho unsavoury business because it revoaled the badness of the old diplomacy. It also proved that even when within the League a nation cannot be forced to accept a policy of whioh it disapproves.”—Times.

PEACE OF WORLD

Received March 24, 11.55 a.m. LONDON March 23. Sir Austen Chamberlain wore a stern expression on entering the crowded and expectant Houso of Commons, which did not relax in response to the Ministerial cheers

Mr Lloyd George ininiated the debate, moving a reduction of the Foreign Office vote so as to call attention to tho proceedings at Geneva and the action of the British representative there. Ho regretted that Sir Austen Chamberlain had not seen fit to take the floor first, as he did after Locarno and explain how the Locarno Pact had been checked at Geneva. Ho declared that the Locarno Powers were responsible for tho Geneva failure. The peaco of tho world hung on the action which the Houso of Commons took and directed the Government to take in future. Tho events at Geneva had undoubtedly antagonised the United States to the League. Sweden, who took tho right and courageous course at Geneva, represented the public opinion of Britain also, yet the Swedish delegate, M. Unden, was treated as a stubborn irreconcilable and pro-German, though he had done more to save tho League than any other one man.

GERMANY’S DEMANDS,

FULFILMENT DESIRED,

Received March 24, 11.10 a.m

BERLIN, March 23

The Reichstag, by 259 to 141 votes, rejected tho Gorman National Party’s demand for a motion of no-confidence in tho Government, including a demand that Germany shall withdraw her application for admission to the League of Nations. If adopted, however, tho Government Parties’ motion approving of the attitudo of the German delegation at Geneva, hut regretting that the outcome of tho Geneva negotiations did not correspond with justifiable German expectations, and declaring that tho Reichstag expects that the Government will speedily obtain guarantees that tho promises made at Locarno, especially as regards the occupied regions, shall he fulfilled as soon as possible in accordance with Germany’s just demands, and thus make effective, before Germany’s entry into the Leaguo, the agreement reached at Geneva with regard to the maintenance and continuanco of the Locarno policy.—Reuter.