FRENCH INSIST ON RIGHTS AT SHANGHAI

Southland Times, Issue 23375, 6 December 1937, Page 5

FRENCH INSIST ON RIGHTS AT SHANGHAI

Own Terms For Japanese Entry

STRONG BRITISH CONDEMNATION OF “VICTORY MARCH”

Tokyo Watching Activity At Hong Kong

(United Press Association—Telegraph Copyright)

(Received December 5, 7 p.m.)

LONDON, December 4.

A tense situation developed at Shanghai when four lorries guarded by Japanese troops attempted to enter the French Bund at Shanghai this morning. They were stopped by French armoured cars, troops and armed police. After an hour’s parley between Japanese and French officers the Japanese, under persuasion from their consular authorities, agreed to accept the French terms, which were that the convoys should submit to a police escort through the concesThe Japanese “victory march” through the International Settlement on Friday is condemned by the British Press. “To make a gratuitous display of military pomp through several miles of streets crowded with Chinese was to invite outrages,” says The Times in an editorial. “The Shanghai Municipal Council may well be relieved that nothing worse occurred. The Japanese were trailing their coat, but what they hoped to gain by it is not clear. Not even the most shortsighted of her military leaders can suppose that Japan will be permitted to seize control of the International Settlement on such a slender pretext as she went out of her way to manufacture. . ... “The Powers with interests in China have put up witn a great deal from Japan, but it would be a mistake by Japan to exaggerate the amount of damage she has done them and base on that amount how much further she can go with impunity. Japan has certainly gone very far, but it would be imprudent of her to subject foreign interests m China to more than what they have come to regard as fair wear and Outspoken articles in the Japanese Press and a less open movement of bombers and troops in the Canton area suggest that Hong Kong is a desirable acquisition in the eyes of Japan’s militarists, says The Daily Telegraph. The local Japanese Consul is already protesting about anti-Japanese activities in Hong Kong, but an infection which Japanese themselves disseminate so rapidly will not be easily cured, it adds.