ACTIONS AND REACTIONS AT GENEVA

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXX, 2 July 1936, Page 6

ACTIONS AND REACTIONS AT GENEVA

RECENT events at Geneva have been both significant and dramatic. In the first place, the Italian delegate informed the delegates of Britain, France, and Russia that Italy would react strongly if the Emperor of Abyssinia were permitted to address the gathering. The reaction to this threat was that Haile Selassie was allowed to address the Assembly, and when he rose to speak the Italian journalists, present to report the proceedings, made a hostile demonstration against the exiled Negus, and were immediately taken into custody by the police! But the Italians not only tried to prevent the Emperor from speaking; their Government presented to the League a memorandum which contained the following passage: “Italy views the work she has undertaken in Ethiopia as a sacred mission to civilisation, and proposes to carry it out according to the principles of the Covenant of the League ” It will be interesting to mark how the League regards this extraordinary statement of the predatory State which has forcibly occupied Abyssinia with hundreds of thousands of troops; and as for Italy’s invocation of the League’s Covenant, it is enough to say that the League’s Council has condemned Italy’s invasion of Abyssinia as- a breach of that Covenant. The speech of the Negus was profoundly impressive. His condemnation of the Italians’ invasion of Abyssinia as a war of conquest will be upheld by the civilised nations of the world, and his reminder. that both the Council and Assembly of the League have declared that Italy has Violated the Covenant, destroys the case which the Italian delegate, Signor Scoppa, presented to the League. The question is, What response will the League make to Abyssinia’s appeal? To ignore it, would mean the confession of the League’s futility. To react favourably would mean that the League must be prepared to use force. Italy, of course, has acted against Abyssinia under the conviction that in no case will the nations of the League be prepared to

use force to uphold the Covenant, which Italy has broken. Matters between the League and Italy have now reached the point when the former must decide (1) Whether it will use force to uphold its Covenant, or (2) whether it will allow a predatory Power to defy it with impunity. If it decides' to uphold its Covenant, what Great Power or Powers will take up arms in its behalf? If it complacently allows Italy to retain the territory she has seized, what becomes of the sanctity of the Covenant and the authority of the League?