RESTORATION OF TURKEY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18851, 2 May 1923, Page 7

RESTORATION OF TURKEY

THE CHESTER AGREEMENT

SIGNING THE CONVENTION,

Press Association—By Telegraph— Copyright

CONSTANTINOPLE, April 30. Colonel Kennedy (United States) representing Admiral Chester, and Fevzi Jbey, Commissar of Public Works, signed the convention embodying the Chester concessions at Angora.—Reuter.

The Daily Express’s Constantinople correspondent reported recently that a comprehensive American scheme for the reconstruction of Turkey included the transformation of Angora into a dream city containing the outstanding features of London, Paris, New i ork, and Washington. The syndicate also proposed to run sugar refineries, to engage in afforestation, to build a network of railways, roads, bridges, canals, irrigation works, and to establish schools of agriculture and engineering, health centres, and hotels under the direction of tourist travel companies. This was merely a summary t the all-embracing trust’s proposed schemes which will reach the uttermost parts of Anatolia. The proposals indicated that, though the United States was" averse to sharing in the European political burdens, American business men were determined to share in any concessions offering. One hundred and fifty members of the American Chambers of Commerce visited Constantinople in connection with the matter. The Angora Assembly lost no time m ratifying the concessions, acceptance of the scheme being approved on April 11. The agreement provided for the employment of Turkish labour only., following the ratification, General Goethals, who built the Panama Canal and is president of the Chester firm, hurried to consult with the State Department, whose experts freely admitted the responsibility which the concession placed upon the United States. The latter will now be compelled to participate in the problems growing out of the Turkish question and the Far Eastern mandates. The feeling in America was that Angora acted quickly because it desired American capital in Turkey, and it was apprehended that the latter country might now use the United States against Britain and France in the Mosul questions and other Far Eastern problems.