THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 1938 STRIFE IN A BALTIC PORT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23177, 25 October 1938, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 1938 STRIFE IN A BALTIC PORT

i Once more an international question concerning Germans outside the Reich is creating fear of a disastrous explosion. Its location is Memel, at a river-mouth on the Baltic. Before the World War this area was in Germany, as part of East Prussia, but by the Treaty of Versailles it wa's handed over by Germany to the Principal Allied and Associated Powers for final disposition. Eventually they gave ib to Lithuania, an eastern neighbour. This disposal of it, although well intended and patiently decided, was not productive of peace, and the fact that a large number of the district's people were German in origin soon occasioned trouble. It is this trouble that has broken out afresh, as a sequel to, the settlement of the Sudeten dispute in Czechoslovakia. The Memel Germans are urging that they likewise should have relief from an irksome regime, and it is said that a "Back to the Reich" demand may be made by them. Such a crisis may be averted, but in view of recent happenings in Czechoslovakia the situation is naturally regarded in Europe with anxiety. As in other instances of tentative territorial arrangements made when the map of Europe was redrawn after the war—those of the Saar, of Silesia, and of Danzig—that of Memel has provided only a temporary answer to a vexing question, and careful handling will be required to make this answer satisfactory in the future. The alternative appears to be a repetition of Nazi intervention by threat of force, and this is an alternative fraught with danger beyond the seat of trouble. The importance of the region is out of proportion to its size. As a port on the Baltic, where the river Niemen (called Memel near it's mouth) reaches the sea, it had served East Prussia, Lithuania and to a small extent Russia ; by the political resurrection of Poland a fourth country had to be considered when the question of Memel's possession was faced after the war. The Conference of Ambassadors, entrusted with problems of the kind, drew up a statute which Lithuania refused to accept, on the ground that it was extravagantly favourable to Poland. This statute reasonably assumed that Lithuania was meant to have possession—Lithuania had no other outlet to the sea —but Poland made extensive demands, and the predominantly German character of the population could not be ignored. A complete deadlock ?irose, and the conference referred the question to the League, as a dispute between the Allied Powers and Lithuania, for its direct adjudication. It was not a question suitable for World Court settlement, and the League Council, at its December meeting in 1923, came to the conclusion that, while in some aspects political, it turned largely on technical considerations relating to the navigation of the river. Accordingly, it appointed a commission—two transit experts, one a Swede and the ether a Dutchman, with Mr. Norman Davis, a former Acting-Secretary of State at Washington, as an impartial president—to prepare a report. This they speedily did. It was accepted at the League Council table by all the Allied representatives and the Lithuanian Prime Minister. Unfortunately, Lithuania had become involved, in January of 1923, in an illegal attempt to obtain possession. Irregular Lithuanian troops had seized the town and district of Memel, defying the Allies' army of occupation, who withdrew in order to prevent bloodshed. These irregulars set up a de facto Government. Although Lithuania could plead innocent of an attempt to force the position, this action intensified quarrelsome relations with Poland, already inclined to regard Lithuania with enmity. It was an unpromising start.

Nevertheless, the commissioners' report offered a new beginning. Upon it was based the Statute of Memel, expressive of the convention signed at Geneva. By the terms of this statute, the Memel territory became a unit within the sovereignty of Lithuania, enjoying legislative, judicial, administrative and financial autonomy within prescribed limits, with a governor appointed by the Lithuanian Republic. The port, under these terms, was to be regarded as under international regime ; its harbour board was to be representative of the various national interests concerned, and to include a technical expert of neutral nationality appointed by the League. By this solution the League sought to safeguard all interests, care being taken to specify at the outset certain detailed rights of transit from the hinterlands of each country. But the feud between Poland and Lithuania, apart from the port, has combined with German restiveness at the loss of the territory to invest Memel with a sinister international meaning. From time to time, since it passed from the League's hands in May of 1921, its affairs have been the subject of complaint, either by the local Diet or by foreign Powers. Adequate legal machinery exists for dealing with alleged grievances, but as in the case of Danzig, only faintly similar, political friction has prevented the smooth working of this machinery. Economic difficulties within the territory, especially an increase in unemployment, have induced the Memel Germans to contest the competence of outsiders, or the governor, to do anything with reference to labour laws. Thus there are present all the elements of serious political unrest, in spite of I the liberal provisions of the statute. It is to be hoped that the trouble will be allayed within the territorial limits of Memel itself.