PEACE CONGRESS.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XLV, Issue 11819, 2 May 1919, Page 6

PEACE CONGRESS.

. ..POLAND AND BELGIUM THE EUROPEAN TERRITORIAL CLAIMS. (From R. Riley. Official Jouralist.) Paris, March 8. The colossal work and responsibilities of the Inter-Allied Peace Conference may be Indicated rather than gnaged by a snmmary of the scope and varied character of the almost innumerable claims heard by the Supreme Council of the Allied and Associated Powers for territorial concessions and adjustment arising out of the war, the defeat of the Central Powers and the consequent emancipation of many small nations in Europe, and the tangle of greed and tryanny in past centuries. The questions of general settle ment involved careful conideration of military, naval, political, ethnclogcal, and economic interest?, and the tortuous way of the Council was strewn with pitfalls and delicate difficultes. The scope of the claims may be outlined under the following main geographical divisions—a list which in itself gives the unparalleled range of the great war.—Territorial adjustments were Sought i n Western Europe, South-Eastern Enrspe and the Mediterranean, in eluding the future of Turkey and the settlement of the important question of the control of Constant! nople and the famous Strait, the Turkish Empire in Asia (Anatolia, Armenia, Syria, Palestine, Mesopotamia Kurdistan, Nejd, and Arabia), Persia, Trans-Caucasia, Trans-Oaipie, Africa, (North Equatorial, South-East and South-West), Japan, Russia, and the Pacific. In the division of Western Europe and South-Eastern Europe alone the Council had a tremendous tssk, the claims of Poland, Belgium and France on the one band ana on the other the claim of Italy. Jugo Slavia, Albania. Roumania, Greece, and the Ozecbo Slovakia providing matter for half a dozen international conferences. To get anything like an adequate review of the varied and always interesting demands for national rights and ter rltorial adjustments would require a few volumes and much leisure to write them. Here, one can give only a bald snmmary of the numerous claims.

POLAND The claim? of Poland were especially interesting for the reason that the position of this devastated, but now very hopeful, country was unique, being at the time its claims were hea'd still threatened on three sides; by the Bolsheviks on the east, by the Ukrainian uands on the south-east, and by the Germans on the north-west. The problem oi the Conference, therefore, was not only to settle the future of Poland by giving scope to the national aspirations of a liberated people with keen memories of a bitter past and lofty ambitions for a great future, but to organise them to resist menace in different forms and particularly to keep the country from becoming submerged by Boi ebevism, which, by the way, was described on one occasion at the Peace Conference, as ‘‘a disease which only attacks hungry aod conquered peoples. ” The Polish representative told a moving tale ns regards the history of Poland, but brightened the picture with details of the spirited national movement. That story must be told elsewhere and by another writer. Enough to say that the Polish nation suggested that the future of their country should be viewed from the standpoint of a League of Nations, and helped to itself and to oppose oppression. As regards the question of boundaries, the crucial issue turned upon the possession of Danzig, its hinterland, and the eastern frontiers. Poalnd mast have an outlet to the sea, or forever depend economically and politically on Germany The Polish claims were referred to a special commision.

BELGUM Tbe territorial claims of Belgium are the only claims which can be adequaltey summarised in a single sentence Belgium the revision of the Treaty of April 19th, 1839. It was thr.t tteaty which fixed her territorial status, set up her permanent neutrality, and sowed the poisoned seed for the deadly harvest in 3914. The Congress of Vienna added Belgium ;to .Holland in order to create a buffer against France. Fifteen years later the Belgian Revolution threw off Dutch rale, and shook the foundations of the treaty of 1815 Then the Conference of fiiondon sought 10 re concile Belgian independence with the interests of the five great Powers, and also to preserve the balance of power, but during negotiations Holland attacked and vanquished Belgium, The subsequent treaty deprived her of Limburg and part of Luxemburg. The compensation, was a guarantee of permanent neutrality upon which rested tbe whole of Belgium’s political structure. It was, built on shifting sand, Tbe recent war swept the foundations away. Only* France and Great Britain loy-Hly fulfilled their obligations. Germany and Austria bad violated their treaty, and Russia could not keep it because of troubles of her own. So fhe balance of power bad been upset. Belgium, therfore, appealed for aid to set up a strong and prosperous country, with complete political and economic sovereignty—a demand in alignment with the seventh point of the President’s declaration to Congress on January Bth 1918. Belgium'songht, moreover, stability at tbe sensitive point of Western Europe, where danger bad alvays threatened like a Thug. The repre sentatives of Belgium also made specific claims in respect of the disposal and sovereignty over the Western Scheldt as far as'the sea, the canal, and port o! Terneuzen, and certain concessions inolviog in terssts in Limburg and Luxemburg. These claims also were referred to a special commission.

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