WORLD PEACE

Otago Witness, Issue 3512, 5 July 1921, Page 18

WORLD PEACE

DISARMAMENT QUESTION. TOKIO, June 25. Following a heated debate at a joint meeting of delegates from eight of the largest chambers of commerce, a motion urging the Japanese Government to take the initiative in proposing disarmament to America and Great Britain, was referred to a committee for later presenta- • tion to a meeting of all the- chambers of commerce in Japan. The opposition was based on the argument that the matter was outside the scope of com ; mercial organisations. Those in favour of the proposal urged its adoption lest refusal should intensify the already current suspicions of other Powers regarding Japanese military ambitions. JAPAN’S FOREIGN POLICY. TOKIO, June 27. The National Chanpber of Commerce passed a resolution urging Japan to con chide a disarmament agreement with neighbouring Powers. Viscount Shibusawa declared that Japan’s relations with America and China were regrettably unsatisfactory. He urged the Government to withdraw its troops from Han-kow and Shantung; to exert greater disarmament efforts, and to transfer part of the military expenditure for the development of industry. LORD BRYCE’S ADVICE. LONDON, June 27. Lord Bryce, in his lecture at the inauguration of the Watson Chair of American History at the Mansion House, said that the English-speaking people were growing most rapidly in wealth and population. They now conducted or controlled roost of the commerce of the world. Their influence was greater than that of any stock. If that influence were directed to the same ends it would make a bigger difference to the world’s progress thar any other influence in the development of intellectual and moral sympathy. Rathe than in formal alliances, which often were unstable and sometimes excited jealousy and suspicion in other nations, Britain and America might find a kind of co-operation which would tiest promote the welfare o' the world. It would be to the glory of the English-speaking peoples if they joined in using their influence to guide the feet of all mankind into the way of peace. BRITAIN, AMERICA. AND JAPAN. WASHINGTON, June 30. President Rarmng i:as made an appeal to Congress for an expression favourable to the limitation of armaments through a; international agreement. <l X a-ni vastly more concerned over the favourable attitude of Congress than the form 0 f expression,” he stated in a written communication to trie House Republican leader, Mr Mondell. His desire was granted this afternoon, when the Borah amendment { the Navy Bill authorising the President tr invite Great Britain and Japan to confer and enter an agreement in regard to re ducing the naval programmes annuallv for five years to an extent to he a creed upon was adopted by 530 votes to 4.° PLEA FOR LIMITATION. LONDON, July 3. Mr Hughes, in an article to the Sunday Pictorial, points out that the worlds expenditure on military and naval purposes in IS2O greatly exceeded £1,000,00-0,000. The world, while looking for peace, was actually spending more upon war and warlike preparations than in 1913. If disarmament was not an attainable ideal at present, the limitation of armaments and the settlement of disputes bv peaceable means were goals that we might purely attain. Mr Lloyd George had said that Great Britain was ready to discuss the limitation of armaments with America and the other Great Powers, and President Harding’s recent speeches held cut the hope that some arrangement might |>e arrived at.

“I cannot believe,” added Mr Hughes, ‘‘that other nations will lag behind if Great Britain and America show they are resolved to translate words into action.”