FAILING HEALTH

Southland Times, Issue 21607, 20 January 1932, Page 5

FAILING HEALTH

’ RETIREMENT OF M. BRIAND. APPRECIATION OF SERVICES. i •—■ { (United Press Assn.—By Telegraph—Copyright.) Paris, January 18r M. Briand is retiring to his farm a trai gedy of failing health and failing political > achievement. The root cause is France’s • doubting his foreign policy. This distrust i began with the rise of Hitlerism and Ger- ■ many’s refusal to pay reparations. ! Sir John Simon, the British Foreign Secretary, in a letter to M. Briand sent on hearing of the latter’s decision not to remain in office, wrote: “I cannot allow the occasion to pass without expressing my own personal regret at your decision after your long and distinguished tenure of office and the great services you have rendered to the cause of peace. I need not assure you that it would have been a matter of ’ especial gratification to be enabled to continue with you the collaboration which we began so happily together, but as this | is not to be I must console myself with the reflection that you will continue, though out of office, to lend the weight of your great authority in the cause for which you worked so long and with such pre-eminent distinction.”