INTERNATIONAL LAW.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 12697, 27 October 1904, Page 4

INTERNATIONAL LAW.

Whatever may be the issue of the North Sea outrage—and there is every indication that Russia will make full and prompt amends-—the aggregate result of her repeated, and occasionally murderous, violations o£ the rights of neutrals .must be to draw closer together all civilised nations and to give a great impetus to the enunciation and enforcement of international law. For although it may serve the temporary purposes of such potentate!? as the Kaiser to tacitly approve the barbaric policy of Russia when his own nation is not a sufferer, but a gainer, it is not even to the ultimate interests of Germany that retrograde steps should be taken in international jurisprudence. While for great world empires such as the British has long been, as the American is fast becoming, and as the French may fairly be termed, and for minor States with extensive oceanic commerce, such as the Scandinavias, Holland and Italy, it is becoming ' more and more imperative that they ! should come to a clear mutual understanding as to the conditions under which their ships shall pursue their ordinary and lawful way as neutrals in waters scoured by belligerent craft. A hundred years ago, when all Europe was involved in the tremendous duel waged between England and France, there was very little respect for the neutral, because civilisation as an entity regarded neutrality as practically non-existent. Every European State was compelled by force of circumstances to declare for one side or the other, and the famous "Armed Neutrality of the North"—shattered by Nelson at Copenhagen—was simply a Napoleonic device to nurse naval forces until they could be brought into action against us with telling effect. But even in those days our kinsmen of Americaestranged from and embittered against the British Government of the day by the still pungent memories of the revolutionary struggle in which they asserted the inherent and now acknowledged rights of colonial Englishmen to ordain their own taxes—insisted that their neutral flag must be respected by belligerents and fought, again in defence of it. In. the ninety years which have well nigh elapsed since Waterloo crowned the turning victory of Trafalgar, the whole face of the world has altered. Long years of peace, world-wide expansion of civilisation, the application to commerce and industry of the multitudinous inventions of mechanicians and discoveries of scientists—may we not add, the growth of a broader and widei view of what constitutes civilisation and of what is the goal and aim of human effort—have combined to transform international relationship. So that modern wars rarely . involve ,the dominant States of the world, who are steadily and earnestly endeavouring to bring about a permanent status of mutual peace and goodwill by referring their disputes to that arbitration which becomes possible as they cease to trespass upon one another and recognise that their common civilisation constitutes a bond and a league. The effect of this transfer of naval preponderance from fighting States to pacific States, from belligerents to neutrals, must be to change fundamentally the acknowledged principles of international law. While we must leave to diplomacy and jurisprudence the methods by which the modern position of neutrals will be defined and asserted, it is easy to foresee the lines which the international law will follow. Firstly and foremostly the complete and unconditioned freedom of the high seas to neutral shipping will be established. That is inevitable: That great and powerful States will continue to tolerate the stoppage and search of their vessels, the seizure of their private property, in any part of the world, by any State which happens to be at war, is preposterous. To regard it as possible is to assume that civilisation is more concerned in securing casual and minor advantage in time of war than permanent and major advantage in time of peace. Such incidents as that of the Malacca, of a British mail steamer being coolly carried off by foreigners under the legallyspiked guns of British men-of-war, are only possible because, as we pointed out, a barbaric Power intrudes its interpretations upon an undefined international understanding. And as belligerents have reasonable, though not unreasonable, rights, civilisation, will doubtless acknowledge their right to stop and search neutral ships entering a circumscribed zone of war, such as within a hundred miles of regions where a state of war has been officially declared to exist. But, again, civilisation will not consent to allow the Prize Courts of belligerents to exercise . authority over neutrals charged with violation of neutrality ; international courts will take their place and thus put an end to the farcical processes of which Vladivostok has given us several examples. Nor will international law hesitate to assert the rights of the dominant neutrals by limiting the areas over [ which naval hostilities may be carried on. The oceans and high seas will be asserted to belong primarily to peaceful commerce and peaceful industry and not to be justly disturbed at their will and pleasure by any Powers which happen to come to blows. Such intolerable outrages as that of the North Sea will hardly happen when belligerents are kept "within the ropes," nor will such equally disgraceful and murderous incidents as the sinking of the British steamer Hip sang be likely to recur. Of the Hipsang, we would remind our readers that the Naval Court at Shanghai directed the attention of the Foreign Office "to the fact that the steamer Hipsang was proceeding , with due caution between Niuchwang and Chifu on, a correct course and without any just cause or reason was sunk without any warning by being torpedoed and that the loss of life was due to shellfire, prior to the act of torpedoing

the vessel, and that these acts were done by a Russian torpedo-boat destroyer, name unknown, but numbered .7." The North Sea accident may have arisen from a misunderstanding, so may the Malacca incident, so may.th© Hipsang outrage, so may every one of the hundred violations of neutrality that have occurred. But civilised nations must take steps to make such, misunderstandings impossible, and will do so, as we have indicated, by deliberately and after full discussion and consideration, developing international law in the direction of restraining definitely and unequivocally the barbaric idea, now peculiar to Russia, that neutrals have no rights and.war no limitations.