DISCLOSURE CAUSES BERLIN SENSATION.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17699, 20 November 1925, Page 1

DISCLOSURE CAUSES BERLIN SENSATION.

GERMANS HAD NO POWER TO INITIAL PACT. By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. Aus. and Ts.Z. Cable Association. (Received .'November 20, 10.30 a.m.) BERLIN, November 19. A sensation was caused as the result of the disclosure by Ilcrr Brauns, Minister of Labour and leading ('entrist, that the German delegation to Locarno had no Cabinet mandate to. initial the Pact documents. Ilcrr Brauns and Ilerr Itho, senior Minister, left Berlin during the absence of Herr,Luther and Dr Stresemann. They declared that the day the Pact was initialled an official telegram was despatched to Locarno demanding the postponement cf the initialling, but it arrived too late. “ We originally thought that at Locarno there would merely be a plain ordinary discussion between the Foreign Ministers concerned. Even when the members of the delegation departed we still thought the discussions would not. be binding.” The members of the Cabinet remaining in Berlin first heard of the initialling proposal on the day on which it occurred. The Nationalist. Press seized on the incident, demanding a thorough investigation of the whole facts, and it is noteworthy that the Centrists’ Congress at which Ilerr Brauns made the statement has concluded, passing a resolution in favour uf the Government’s policy.