POLICY ON ARMS

Taranaki Daily News, 26 January 1934, Page 7

POLICY ON ARMS

STATEMENT NEXT WEEK BRITISH CABINET DISCUSSION QUESTION OF ACTIVE WORK DEEP ANXIETY OF CHURCH “REALITIES RECOGNISED” By Telegraph—Press Assn. —Copyright. Rec. 10 p.m. London, Jan. 25. ■ The British Cabinet will make a definite statement of its disarmament policy when Parliament reassembles next week. Recent diplomatic exchanges indicated that such a statement from the British Government would be welcomed. It is understood that at a meeting of the. Cabinet this afternoon the situation regarding disarmament was reviewed in the light of recent developments. These included the exchange of Notes between France and Germany, the replies given by the German Government to questions addressed to them by the British Ambassador in Berlin and the results of conversations on the subject in which Sir John Simon, British Foreign Secretary, took part during his visit to Geneva last week. Very careful consideration is now being given to the question of what further step by Britain can be made to prepare the ground for the resumption of the active work of the Disarmament Conference. The Archbishop of York, presiding at the Upper House Convocation, expressed the deep anxiety with which the bishops were watching the negotiations for a solution, without which there could be no recovery for the world from the economic issues which beset it. “However strong and clear our ideals may be,” he said, “we must recognise the realities of the difficulties of adjusting the natural claim of Germany for equality with the equally natural claim of France for security, but we earnestly hope that some preliminary convention may be obtained which will clear the way within the near future for a wider and fuller convention on the basis not of levelling up armaments but of reducing by common consent to a. level necessary for internal safety and defence.”

Cabinet decided to use its influence through diplomatic channels, the Daily Telegraph understands, to promote a solution of the Franco-German disarmament differences. Italy’s collaboration was regarded as assured. There was no suggestion of summoning a four-Power conference.