SYSTEM CRITICISED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26996, 3 February 1949, Page 5

SYSTEM CRITICISED

EMPIRE CONSULTATION BRITAIN’S RECOGNITION OF ISRAEL LONDON, Feb. 1. “As Mr Bevin’s Palestine decision gets discussed, interesting points begin to emerge,” says the Glasgow Hei'ala. “To critics of the delay in announcing the decision to grant de facto recognition of Israel after it had to all intents and purposes been taken, the answer was given that the delay was caused by the necessity of consulting the dominions. “ One obvious point is that if it takes so long to get answers, the machinery of consultation might well be overhauled. In times like the present, the period in which diplomatic decisions can profitably be taken is not unlimited, and the need for speed increases almost daily. It also emerges that the three Asiatic dominions have said ‘No,’ and intend to pursue an anti-Israel policy.

“Such a policy is quite understandable on the part of Pakistan, and is quite characteristic of Mr Nehru, but is by no means so obvious on the part of Cevlon. But that it should exist—that there should be two quite contradictory Commonwealth policies, each actively pursued—is not so easy to swallow.

“It suggests that not only the machinery of consultation should be overhauled, but the whole conception of consultation.

“Mr Bevin was not always so eager to consult and risk getting a negative answer. He told the dominions of our intention to evacuate Egypt, and, quite aware of the difference between being consulted and being informed, the dominions did not hesitate to criticise him for not genuinely consulting them then.

“ It is impossible not to suspect that the reason for the pretext of elaborate consultation was simply to provide an excuse for delay. Mr Bevin got his delay all right, but he also afforded to other nations a glaring case of Commonwealth division, in which it would appear that the decision was the result of a majority vote as reckoned in London. “Is this a new method, and do majority votes inevitably prevail? Or what is the system? A system is needed badly, and one apparently obtains, but what is it. and what is its constitutional value? ”