CENTRAL EUROPE FINDS WAY TO AVOID TROUBLE

Manawatu Times, Volume LV, Issue 7201, 26 April 1930, Page 4

CENTRAL EUROPE FINDS WAY TO AVOID TROUBLE

Complicated Problems

VIENNA, April 5.

The agreements reached at tho Hfigue Conferenco and later ratified in Paris on the problems of non-German repartitions indicate the end of tho war chapter as far as central Europe is cohccrned.

The complicated and apparently \insolVablo problems arising out of the dismetlibermciit of tho fdrifter' AusjtfoHungariaii Ethpiro hdvb been worked out iu a manner rndre favdtirhblo to all conCbritCd thiin whs even imagined pbkslblo tl few liioilths ago. Austria, except for annual payments of. I,OOO,thJU gold crowns (£40,000) until 1953* is financially free, and able to arrange fdr the international loan which its present economic conditions require.

The great point of difference betweon the States of the Littlo Entente and Hungary, over tho optauts’ question, has been settled; hcncofqfth the land reforms introduced into Rumania, Czechoslovakia.and Jugoslavia are subject only to the jurisdiction of these individual States, and the fear of possible future claims for high compensation by dispossessed foreign landowners, chiefly Hungarian, arc removed once and for all. Hungary has vindicated tho legality of its claims for compensation for its own,, nationals whose property was seized, and this State, together with Bulgaria and the Little Entente States, now know definitely tho sums payable by them as final liquidation of the financial prob-

lems loffc over from the peace treaties. For tho last tCn years distrust, fear and suspicion have prevailed in these parts; political Combinations have grown up either to safeguard tho rights graiited by the peach treaties or to combat such rights. Central Europe has presented the picture of an armed camp, on the one side the Little Entente, and on tho other Hungary, with Austria struggling to eontinuo its separate existence, though all the tinie talking much df all “Anschluss” with Germany. But to-day a largo number of tho reasons for this abnormal state of affairs has disappeared, and public loaders of tho individual countries are talking and writing of tho possibilities of pew lines of approach between the neighbour States, bdlh politically and economically. Politically, the chief obstacle to better understanding in Central Europe lies iii thd misiindeirStandiug between Czechoslovakia and Hungary. It should be niade clear from the outset that disputes hs to frontier issues, complaints as to the treatment of national minorities on both sides, etc., while they are important aiid often justified, do not constitute tho fundamental problem awaiting solution. Hungary naturally feels resentment at tho loss'of its former province of Slovakia, and lives in hopd that it toll duo day become Hungarian territory Once more. But at bottom, the struggle is due to the great difference between the social and economic systems prevailing in these neighbour States, a contrast between democracy and autocracy, between advanced ideas of land ownership and feudalism —-for Hungary’s best friends do not gainsay the fact that- the present rule of the magnates in that Stato is still feudal. Czechoslovakia, following the example of its president, leans toward the democracy of tho West. Hungary,

in its system and outlook, tends toward Fascism, and its close understanding with Italy gives foreign observers the impression that it is more closely we ded to that form of government than is actually the case. A statement oi these facts does not necessarily imply justification of tho ono at the expense of the other, for tho present situation is the outcome of a number of different historical reactions in these parts of Europe, but at the same time it does serve to show how difficult is the road to understanding.